Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited, Islamabad, through this Intra-court appeal under section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance, 1972, impugns the order, dated 23-11-2006, passed by the learned Single Judge in Chamber of this Court in Writ petition No,2959 of 2006, whereby by issuing the pre-admission notice to the present appellants, who are respondents Nos.3 and 4 in the said writ petition, with a direction to file parawise comments within two weeks, and on the application for grant of stay it has been ordered that respondent Rizwan Ahmed Bhatti shall be treated as a suspended employee until the next date of hearing on 28-11-2006 and no action adverse to that status shall be taken till then.
2. At the outset, when confronted about the maintainability of the present I.C.A. Under section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance, 1972, the learned counsel contends that notwithstanding anything contained in section 3 of the Ordinance, 1972 an appeal is maintainable to the Bench of two or more Judges of the High Court from an interlocutory order made by a Single Judge in exercise of original jurisdiction on the mandate of section 15 of the Ordinance X of 1980, Code of Civil Procedure (Amendment) Ordinance, 1980. To substantiate his plea he has relied on the case reported as Brother Steel Mills Limited and others v. Mian Ilyas Siraj and 14 others PLD 1996 SC 543.
Further contends that since the order has been passed in the petition under Article 199 of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, in which principles of Civil Procedure Code are applicable to the proceedings and the constitutional jurisdiction is original civil jurisdiction therefore, the appeal is competent.
3. We have heard the arguments of the learned counsel for the appellant at some length. It is appropriate that reference be made to the relevant provisions of law which provide for an appeal against the judgment, order or decision passed by the single Judge of this Court. Section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance reads hereunder:--
3. Appeal to High Court in certain cases.--- (1) An appeal shall lie to a Bench of two or more Judges of a High Court from a decree passed or final order made by a single Judge of that Court in the exercise of its original civil jurisdiction.
(2) An appeal shall also lie to a Bench of two or more Judges of a High Court from an order made by a single Judge of that Court under clause (1) of Article 199 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan not being an order made under subparagraph (i) of paragraph (b) of that clause: Provided that the appeal referred to in this subsection shall not be available or competent if the application brought before the High Court under Article 199 arises out of any proceedings in which the law applicable provided for at least one appeal or one revision or one review to any Court, Tribunal or authority against the original order.
(3) No appeal shall lie under subsection (1) or subsection (2) from an interlocutory order or an order which does not dispose of the entire case before the Court.
(4) Nothing contained in this Ordinance shall be construed as affecting:--
(a) any appeal under the provisions of the Letters Patent applicable to a High Court or under section 102 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (V of 1908) which was pending immediately before the commencement of this Ordinance; or
(b) any appeal or petition for leave to appeal from a decree, judgment or order of a single Judge of a High Court made to the Supreme Court before the commencement of the Law Reforms (Amendment) Ordinance, 1972."
4. Section 15 of the Ordinance X of 1980, Code of Civil Procedure (Amendment) Ordinance, 1980 is reproduced as under:-- "15. Appeal to High Court in certain cases.--- Notwithstanding anything contained in section 3 of the Law .Reforms Ordinance, 1972 (XII of 1972), an appeal shall lie to a Bench of two or more Judges of a High Court from an interlocutory order made by a Single Judge of that Court in exercise of its original civil jurisdiction."
5. The main question about the maintainability of the appeal can be resolved by quoting the above provisions of law. Before we proceed to interpret the above quoted provisions of law, it is important to read Article 175 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, which is reproduced hereunder:- "175. Establishment and jurisdiction of Courts.--- (1) There shall be a Supreme Court of Pakistan, a High Court for each Province and such other Courts as may be established by law.
(2) No Court shall have any jurisdiction save as is or may be conferred on it by.The Constitution or by or under any law.
(3) The judiciary shall be separated progressively from the executive within fourteen years from the commencing day."
Under Article of 175 of the Constitution, a Court is vested with the jurisdiction as is, or may be conferred on it by the Constitution or by law, therefore, jurisdiction can be conferred on any Court, including a High Court, by enactment of the Parliament, which may provide for initiating the proceedings in that Court as a Court of original civil jurisdiction. If it relates to the civil dispute, it will be termed as original civil jurisdiction. Under the above Article of the Constitution, jurisdiction can be conferred on the Court, including on the High Court, by a statute conferring jurisdiction to resolve civil disputes in its original jurisdiction as a Court of first instance. For instance, under section 2(1)(ii) of the Banking Companies (Recovery of Loans) Ordinance, 1979, in respect of cases in which the amount of loan exceeds Rs,1 million, the High Court in exercise of original civil jurisdiction assumes the jurisdiction. Similarly in the Companies Ordinance, original civil jurisdiction has been conferred on the High Court. Under section 7 of the Companies Ordinance, the Court having the jurisdiction under the Ordinance shall be the High Court. The case of Sunrise Textile Limited and others v. Mashreq Bank PSC PLD 1996 Lah. 1 supports the contention that jurisdiction of the Court under the Companies Ordinance is original civil jurisdiction. While interpreting the provisions of section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance and section 15 of the Ordinance X of 1980, a Division Bench of Peshawar High Court in the case reported as Muhammad Ismail v. Secretary to Government of N.-W.F.P. Settlement/Rehabilitation Department, Peshawar and 7 others PLD 1988 Pesh. 19 relying on the case of Hussain Bakhsh v. Settlement Commissioner PLD 1970 SC 1, wherein it was held that, "as proceedings which deals with a right of a civil nature does not cease to be so merely because the right is sought to be enforced by having recourse to the writ jurisdiction judged from these aspects, a proceeding under Article 98 of the Constitution relating to a civil matters is a civil proceeding, although the High Court's jurisdiction in such a proceeding is constitutional jurisdiction of an original kind" held that the mere fact that the principles of Code of Civil Procedure are applicable to the proceedings commenced under writ jurisdiction, would not mean that the latter proceedings were commenced under the Code of Civil Procedure and pertain to the original .Civil jurisdiction of the High Court. It was further held that although writ jurisdiction and constitutional jurisdiction but it is not original civil jurisdiction and constitutional jurisdiction of High Court and original civil jurisdiction are two separate and distinct jurisdictions and therefore, appeal lies to a Bench of two or more Judges of the High Court from an interlocutory order made by a Single Judge of the Court in the exercise of its original civil jurisdiction. Such an appeal, however, would not be competent when a Judge of the High Court has made any interlocutory order in the exercise of writ jurisdiction under Article 199 of the Constitution.
6. The case of Muhammad Ismail (supra), of the Division Bench of Peshawar High Court was taken note of by the Honourable Supreme Court in the case of Brother Steel Mills Ltd. And others v. Mian Ilyas Miraj and 14 others PLD 1996 SC 543, cited by the learned counsel for the appellant. In the said case a petition under section 290 of the Companies Ordinance was pending adjudication before the Company Judge when an application under section 292 of the Ordinance praying that the management of the Company be replaced by an impartial agency/board/administrator, which application was granted vide judgment, dated 19-1-1995 and the management of the Company was suspended/removed and Inspector already appointed by the Corporate Law Authority to conduct investigation was appointed as Administrator to act as Chief Executive of the Company and perform functions of the management. On behalf of Brother Steel Mills Limited petition for leave to appeal was granted to consider, inter alia, if from the order impugned in the petition the right of appeal was available to the petitioners before a larger Bench of the High Court. The Honourable Supreme Court taking note of constitutional provisions of Article 175, the provisions of law, i,e, section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance, and section 15 of Ordinance X of 1980, Code of Civil Procedure (Amendment) Ordinance, 1980 and discussing the entire case-law concluded that since under the Companies Ordinance which is a statute promulgated conferring jurisdiction on the High Court to entertain the appeal, the appeal before the Honourable Supreme Court not maintainable and dismissed the said appeal. However, the appeals were remitted to the High Court with a direction to be treated as I.C.A. Pending before it.
7. Since the impugned order has not been passed by the learned Single Judge in exercise of its original civil jurisdiction under any statute or law but in exercise of jurisdiction under Article 199 of the Constitution, therefore, no appeal lies under subsections (1) and (2) of section 3 of the Law Reforms Ordinance, 1972, from an order being interlocutory and the order which does not dispose of the entire case before the Court, because the case had already been fixed before the learned single Judge for 28-11-2006.
8. For what has been discussed above, this I.C.A. Fails and is dismissed in limine.