SC to take up PTI petition against ECP delimitation on May 16.

ISLAMABAD -- A division bench of the Supreme Court led by Justice Ijaz ul Ahsan will on May 16 take up the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's petition to stop the Election Commission of Pakistan's (ECP) delimitation of constituencies and hold elections without any delay.

PTI secretary general Asad Umar had filed the petition through his counsels Chaudhry Fawad Hussain and Chaudhry Faisal Hussain on April 18.

The PTI had moved the top court seeking a declaration that the delimitation schedule announced by the electoral watchdog on April 11 was 'illegal" and 'unconstitutional'.

The petition further requested the SC to order the election supervisor and secretary to ensure the upcoming electoral process was in accordance with the law and Constitution, and was carried out without any delays.

The application contended that the endeavour by the ECP to carry out new delimitations of provincial and national constituencies across the country and the subsequent schedule it issued amounted to a departure from Article 51(5), which provides that seats in the National Assembly shall be allocated to each province on the basis of population in accordance with the last census officially published.

'As the delimitation exercise conducted in 2018 under the command of the Constitution must be...