The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf filed a petition in the Supreme Court on Wednesday against a new bill that would bar independent lawmakers from joining a political party after a certain period.

The ‘Elections (Second Amendment) Act, 2024’ proposes changes to the Elections Act 2017, which appears to be aimed at circumventing the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that granted the PTI reserved seats, making it the single largest party in the National Assembly.

The bill was introduced in the National Assembly by a PML-N lawmaker, Bilal Azhar Kayani, and was quickly passed through the Standing Committee on Parliamentary Affairs with an 8-4 vote.

The legislation was then hastily passed by both the National Assembly and the Senate, without any substantial debate, by suspending the rules.

PTI MNA Gohar Ali Khan has now filed a petition in the Supreme Court, requesting the court to declare the newly passed amendments as “unconstitutional.”

The PTI’s petition, filed under Article 184(3) of the Constitution, argues that the impugned act subverts the democratic process and violates the fundamental rights of the people, as guaranteed by the Constitution.

The petition contends that “past and closed transactions” that have taken place in accordance with the existing Constitution and the Elections Act, 2017 cannot be undone through the “deemed retrospectively” provisions of the new law. It further states that the “expression of the will of the people once made cannot be retrospectively subjected to restrictions that were non-existent at the time, and that are in any case unconstitutional.”

The petition asserts that such legislation “suffers from malice in law” and that “actions taken by the people and their chosen representatives in the exercise of their constitutional rights cannot be undone by parliament through legislation.”

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The federal government and the Election Commission of Pakistan have been named as respondents in the case.

Notably, the PTI’s petition also requests the Supreme Court to bar the ECP from allocating the reserved seats for women and minorities to other political parties, and instead grant them to the PTI as per the court’s previous order on July 12.

The PTI has argued that it has already submitted its list of candidates for the reserved seats to the ECP, underscoring the party’s commitment to defending its constitutional rights and the will of the people.