Judicial Reforms
By Col.Riaz Jafri (Retd)
Westridge, Rawalpindi
Addressing a Pakistan Bar Council seminar on December 16, 2017, Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar sought the cooperation of Council members for carrying out judicial reforms to provide expeditious justice to the public.
Citing cases pending in courts, like the one of a widow deprived of her family pension for 15 years, or many litigations going on and on for decades for disputed land or property, the CJP asked the lawyers if that was the kind of justice that the bar and the bench were dispensing to the pitiful masses?
He passionately solicited their considered suggestions and proposals to improve this dismal state of affairs.
It is 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 lawyers promote crime by defending someone whom they know to have committed an offence and yet try that the offender be allowed to go scot-free? Besides, “smart” lawyers brag about the ‘hidden’ legal lacunae they found in the proceedings and the hairsplitting of legalities that they indulged in to confound the issue to the advantage of their client!
If lawyers stop defending a known culprit or an accused the moment they come to know of his/her complicity in a crime, I think the crime rate could drop manifold.
• Could the bar and the bench also give this a thought?
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