ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Thursday set aside earlier court rulings in a Rs10 billion ($35.7 million) defamation case filed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif against former premier Imran Khan and ordered the matter to be reconsidered by a trial court.
In a short order, a two-member majority of the three-judge bench allowed a review petition filed by Khan and directed the trial court to provide him a “reasonable opportunity” to file replies to interrogatories before proceeding with the case.
The term “interrogatories” refers to written questions submitted by one party to another during civil proceedings, which the recipient is required to answer under oath to the best of their knowledge.
“The matter is remanded to the Trial Court with the direction to provide the Petitioner reasonable opportunity to file his reply to the interrogatories and proceed with the suit in accordance with law,” the court said.
The court set aside an earlier Supreme Court majority judgment dated Dec. 29, 2022, as well as judgments of the high court and trial court, and remanded the matter to the trial court for further proceedings in accordance with the law.
The case stems from a Rs10 billion defamation suit filed by Sharif in 2017 after Khan alleged that Sharif had offered Rs10 billion through an intermediary to persuade him to withdraw proceedings related to the Panama Papers scandal, which ultimately led to the disqualification of his elder brother and then-prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
Shehbaz Sharif denied the allegation and sought damages.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Khan’s party, welcomed the ruling, saying it restored Khan’s right to defend himself in the case.
“The decision corrects a serious legal injustice whereby Imran Khan had been denied the opportunity to present his defense and challenge the allegations against him,” the party said in a statement.
The government had not publicly responded to the ruling at the time of filing this report.
