AN unfortunate episode in the now long-running tussle between sections of the PML-N leadership and the Supreme Court has ended in an uncomfortable manner.
Nehal Hashmi`s tirade against the Supreme Court last May was unconscionable and unacceptable. The now denotified senator himself appears to have finally realised his error by submitting an unconditional apology to the Supreme Court for his incendiary remarks. While politicians are entitled to defend their party and its leadership fiercely in the court of public opinion, Mr Hashmi`s remarks quite clearly amounted to contempt of court. Following Mr Hashmi`s unconditional apology, however, perhaps the Supreme Court ought to have demonstrated greater forbearance. Instead, a member of parliament was stripped of the privilege to be a public representative for five years and sent to prison for a month. The harsh punishment may cheer political opponents of the PML-N, but it also drags the judiciary deeper into the murky world of politics.
The PML-N is likely to interpret Mr Hashmi`s sentence as a warning shot against Nawaz Sharif and his allies, who have continued to lash out against the judiciary because of Mr Sharif`s disqualification from holding public office. The judicial norm is for a court to use its discretion and hand down a minimal punishment in cases of contempt where a defendant apologises unreservedly to the court. But some PML-N leaders, including Mr Sharif, continue to speak publicly in strident terms about the superior judiciary and its treatment of the Sharif family. Both sides need to reconsider their approach in what is already shaping up to be a fierce campaign season and with accountability trials of the Sharif family members possibly concluded in the middle of the election season. Mr Sharif and the PML-N have every right to question a controversial judicial decision that stripped Mr Sharif of the prime ministership, but they need to be mindful of democratic constraints. The judiciary, meanwhile, ought to consider the impact on the institution of the ever-increasing judicialisation of politics.
