The Islamabad High Court (IHC) has declared the Council of Islamic Ideology’s 2025 opinion against Engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza ‘null and void’, saying the advisory body overstepped its constitutional mandate under Articles 229 and 230.
In a detailed judgment issued before his transfer to the Lahore High Court, Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani declared the Council of Islamic Ideology’s (CII) 2025 opinion against cleric-turned-YouTuber Engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza as “illegal, without lawful authority, and null and void.”
The ruling held that the Council of Islamic Ideology had exceeded its constitutional mandate by acting on a reference forwarded by the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) in a blasphemy-related case.
The court clarified that under Articles 229 and 230 of Pakistan’s Constitution, the CII is limited to advising the president, governors, and legislative bodies, and does not have the authority to determine criminal liability or act as a fact-finding or judicial forum.
Justice Kayani stressed that only courts are empowered to decide guilt or innocence, and warned that the CII’s opinion in an ongoing criminal matter violated the accused’s constitutional right to a fair trial under Article 10-A.
The case stemmed from an NCCIA investigation under Section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code and PECA 2016, where the agency sought the council’s opinion on a YouTube statement and later included it in its investigation record.
