Islamabad [Pakistan], March 6 (ANI): Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan on Monday moved Lahore High Court (LHC) against the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA's) decision to bar all satellite TV channels from broadcasting his speeches and press talks.

The LHC registrar's office has fixed the plea for hearing and Justice Shahid Bilal Hassan will take it up on Tuesday.

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Khan, in the plea, named PEMRA and the authority's director (operations, broadcast media) as respondents.

PEMRA has imposed a ban on broadcasting "live and recorded" speeches and press conferences of Imran Khan on all satellite TV channels with immediate effect, Pakistan-based TV Network ARY News reported on Sunday.

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"It has been observed that Imran Khan [Chairman PTI] in his speeches/statements is continuously alleging state institutions by levelling baseless allegations and spreading hate speech through his provocative statements against state institutions and officers which is prejudicial to the maintenance of law and order and is likely to disturb public peace and tranquillity," the PEMRA said.

According to Khan's plea, the IHC had set aside a similar prohibition order in the past.

Khan's petition said PEMRA had issued the order "in excess of the jurisdiction vested in it and without having regard to the constitutional rights guaranteed under Articles 19 and 19-A of the Constitution". It further contended that the authority was not empowered to issue a blanket prohibition order, which appears to be "in violation of the principle of proportionality".

The plea argued that according to Section 8 of the Pemra Ordinance, one-third of the total number of members were required to constitute a quorum for meetings. But the meeting which passed the order against Imran comprised only the chairman and three members which made the order "coram-non-judice", reported Dawn.

The plea said PEMRA's order was "illegal, unlawful, more than its jurisdiction, and contrary to the fundamental rights as enshrined under the Constitution" and liable to be set aside.

"The Impugned Order in effect has prohibited all news channels from airing live speeches of Imran based on spreading hate speech and making provocative statements against state institutions and officers. It is submitted that no hate speech or any such statements were made against the state institutions during his speech which entails such penal consequences as notified in the impugned order," the petition said, arguing that the ban was in violation of Article 19 of the Constitution and the Pemra Ordinance, 2002, the Dawn reported.

Further, as per the Dawn report, the petition said Imran's speech in question had been "incorrectly labelled as hate speech" and his words were in no way "prejudicial to the maintenance of law and order". It contended that Pemra was taking the statement "out of the context and political backdrop in which it was made in order to create censorship and inhibit the 'freedom of speech'."

The petition said the move to ban Imran's speeches was an "arbitrary and malafide use" of Pemra's powers to "stifle discussion regarding the torture and brutality being carried out against Shahbaz Gill and keep the public at large unaware of the developments in the case and essentially, thwart justice".

It further said that the order was "purely driven out of vengeance" and the respondents invoked criminal proceedings "just to illegally harass the appellants and stop them from pursuing their political activities". (ANI)

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