ISLAMABAD: The Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP) on Tuesday approved the appointment of Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb as a permanent judge of the Supreme Court, months after his initial induction in an ad hoc capacity.
The session, chaired by Chief Justice of Pakistan Yahya Afridi, was the first since the passage of the 27th Constitutional Amendment and the creation of the Federal Constitutional Court (FCC). Justice Aurangzeb had previously been elevated from the Islamabad High Court (IHC) before his temporary posting to the Supreme Court in February.
During the meeting, the JCP also endorsed the elevation of Justice Zafara Ahmed Rajput as Chief Justice of the Sindh High Court (SHC) and Justice Kamran Mullahkhail as Chief Justice of the Balochistan High Court (BHC). The commission considered senior judges for these posts: Justices Rajput, Muhammad Iqbal Kalohoro, and Mahmood A Khan for SHC; and Justices Mullahkhail, Iqbal Ahmed Kasi, and Shaukat Ali Rakhshani for BHC.
Recent changes brought by the 27th Amendment, combined with the appointment of four Supreme Court judges to the newly formed FCC — Justices Aminuddin Khan, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, Aamer Farooq, and Ali Baqar Najafi — as well as the resignations of Justices Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Athar Minallah, have reduced the Supreme Court’s total strength from 24 to 18 judges.
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The meeting was attended by senior judicial and government officials, including FCC Chief Justice Aminuddin Khan, Justices Munib Akhtar, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, and Aamer Farooq, Attorney General Mansoor Usman Awan, Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar, and Pakistan Bar Council nominee Ahsan Bhoon. Parliamentarians Farooq Hamid Naek, Syed Ali Zafar, Sheikh Aftab Ahmad, and Gohar Ali Khan were also present.
Following constitutional reforms, several statutory bodies were restructured. Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail joined both the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) and the Practice and Procedure Committee, while FCC’s Justice Aamer Farooq became a member of the JCP. The SJC remains the highest forum for judicial accountability, the Practice and Procedure Committee manages bench formation and case scheduling, and the JCP continues to oversee appointments across the superior judiciary.
