Law: Constitution of Pakistan, 1973

Section: 199

Constitution of Pakistan, 1973-- ----Art. 199--Constitutional jurisdiction--Judicial review--Judicial restraint--Policy matters--Economic policy--Power sector--NEPRA--Independent Power Producers (IPPS)--Capacity payments--Tariff mechanism--Dollar indexation--Sovereign guarantees--Separation of powers--Maintainability of constitutional petition--Scope of writ jurisdiction--Policy matters, particularly those involving economic, fiscal, commercial and regulatory decisions, fall within exclusive domain of executive and legislature--It was by now a settled principle of constitutional jurisprudence that policy matters fell within exclusive domain of Executive and Legislature--The constitutional jurisdiction of this Court was confined to examining whether any action was tainted by lack of jurisdiction, mala fides, violation of law, or infringement of a specific constitutional or statutory provision--The Court did not sit as an appellate forum over economic, fiscal, commercial or regulatory policies formulated by competent authorities--Questions relating to desirability, wisdom or economic soundness of a policy were not justiciable unless policy was shown to be ex facie unconstitutional or violative of a mandatory provision of law.                                       [P. 625] A Scope of Judicial in Complex Judicial Matter-- ----Review in Complex Judicial matter--Petitioner had challenged an entire regulatory and contractual framework governing national power sector and sought directions requiring redesign of tariff mechanisms, cancellation of sovereign guarantees, recovery of alleged excess payments, restructuring of contractual relationships and initiation of criminal proceedings against public functionaries--Such matters involved complex economic, technical and financial considerations requiring specialized expertise and policy evaluation, which fell outside scope of judicial review under Article 199 of…