Judicial Reforms

The CJP Mian Saqib Nisar addressing a Pakistan Bar Council seminar on Saturday December 16, 2017 sought their cooperation in carrying out the judicial reforms to ensure expeditious justice to the people.  Citing the cases pending in the courts like the one of a widow deprived of her family pension for 15 years or quite a many litigations going on and on for decades for a disputed land or property, the CJP asked the lawyers if that was the kind of justice that the bar and the bench was dispensing to the pitiful masses?  He passionately solicited their considered suggestions and proposals to improve this dismal state of affairs. 

It is very encouraging to see such concerns about the speedy dispensation of justice expressed at such a high level and I wish them Godspeed in their undertakings. 

Kindly allow me to say that I have yet to see a lawyer refusing the brief of a KNOWN culprit. Don’t the lawyers promote crime by defending someone whom they know for definite to have committed the offence and yet try to let him go scot-free? Not only that, the “smart” lawyers then brag about the ‘hidden’ legal lacunae that they found in the proceedings and the hairsplitting of the legalities that they indulged in to confound the issue further to the advantage of their client!  

If the lawyers stop defending a known culprit or stop defending an accused any further the moment they come to know of his/her being the actual culprit, I think the crime rate could go down manifold.

Could the Bar and the Bench also give it a thought?

Col.Riaz Jafri (Retd)