Suo motu - are we done yet?

When the Justices of the Supreme Court make decisions purely on fact and law, independent of any pressure or influence from other branches of the government, or from any private or partisan interest, it is a beautiful thing to behold. Their unflinching passion and love for the supremacy of law reminds us of Shakespeare's sonnet: 'Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, but bears it out even to the edge of doom.' Such an honourable judiciary is able to earn the trust and respect of every citizen of the state who pines for a just society. In the words of WB Yeats: 'I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly because you tread on my dreams.'

From time to time, the 'honorable' justices fail to tread softly. They are sometimes accused of administrating or legislating from the bench. Suo motu or suo moto means 'on its own motion'. In Pakistan, the Supreme Court's liberal use of its suo-motu powers has become a hot-button issue. Whirlwinds of judicial activism, when morphed into judicial overreach, inevitably shake the foundations of democracy. Despite claims of benevolence, critics argue that judicial activism is often a masquerade or a guise to cover up partisan favours extended to political cronies. To make matters worse, military-judiciary alliances and backdoor negotiations in the dark of the night - as alleged - put a damper on the integrity of the judiciary and compromise the sanctity of the separation of powers. Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, a stalwart who refused to acquiesce to the military's wishes, was criticised for his partisan bias and judicial overreach. Same can be said of Justice Saqib Nisar whose dam fund (no pun intended) raised $40 million but ended up costing $63 million in advertising, as reported by The Economic Times.

A system of checks and balances is the cornerstone of democracy. An independent judiciary must abstain from political engineering such as helping or hurting a politician or a political party whether it is PML-N or PPP or PTI. 'The bedrock of our democracy,' noted Caroline Kennedy, a US diplomat and daughter of former US president John F Kennedy, 'is the rule of law and that means we have to have an independent judiciary, judges who can make decisions independent of the political winds that are blowing.'

At times, it is hard to decide between judicial activism and judicial restraint. The US Supreme Court consists of nine Justices. To accept or reject a petition, they use a Rule of Four: if at...