ISLAMABAD: Islamabad Excessive Court docket (IHC) Justice Babar Sattar on Thursday issued notices to the president and secretary of the Islamabad Excessive Court docket Bar Affiliation (IHCBA) for allegedly restraining the legal professionals and litigants from coming into the court docket premises throughout a strike known as by the Pakistan Bar Council.
The choose additionally determined to look at the authority of regulatory our bodies of the legal professionals concerning the issuance of the strike calls and threats of disciplinary motion to legal professionals over non-compliance.
The court docket sought a report together with CCTV footage dated Might 9 from the IHC registrar during which the elected representatives of the IHCBA have been seen stopping their fellow legal professionals.
Senior lawyer Naeem Bukhari by an utility diverted the eye of Justice Sattar that IHCBA President Riasat Ali Azad and different workplace bearers of the bar affiliation stopped his lawyer from showing earlier than the court docket.
Justice Sattar points discover to IHCBA president, secretary for ‘restraining’ legal professionals from coming into courts; seeks CCTV footage
The choose had dismissed the petition of Mr Bukhari concerning a dispute with the federal government associated to the ‘Gun and Nation Membership’ over the non-appearance of his counsel. Mr Bukhari filed an utility searching for the restoration of the petition, whereas additionally accusing Riasat Azad of “bodily restraining” his lawyer from coming into the court docket premises through the strike on Might 9.
The strike name was issued to precise solidarity with the authorized fraternity after the Punjab police used drive to disperse legal professionals who have been protesting in Lahore towards the LHC chief justice’s resolution to maneuver courts.
The Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) and the Supreme Court docket Bar Affiliation (SCBA) had declared Wednesday as a black day and issued a full-day nationwide strike name for all courts, together with the Supreme Court docket, excessive courts, and the subordinate judiciary.
Justice Sattar whereas disposing of the appliance issued notices to the president and secretary of the IHCBA. He additionally issued discover to the Pakistan Bar Council and sought a response by June 10.
The court docket sought a report from the IHC registrar by the following listening to on the mentioned date on “whether or not anybody was prevented from showing earlier than the court docket on Might 09, 2024, resulting from a name for strike issued by the PBC and the Islamabad Bar Council (IBC).
Justice Sattar issued the route to the registrar to make “preparations to play the related CCTV recordings from the related date and the related time, reflecting how the premises of the court docket have been being manned, to fulfill the court docket that the candidates’ counsel and different litigants and/or their legal professionals weren’t being prevented from showing earlier than the court docket”.
He additionally questioned the authority of the PBC and the IBC and requested them to elucidate “underneath what authority can legal professionals stop fellow-lawyers and/or litigants from accessing justice, to be allotted by the courts, and implement the identical by bodily obstruction of passaging to courts”.
The court docket additionally issued discover to the legal professional basic and advocate basic Islamabad and sought their help on the authority of the bar councils “to subject strike calls and threaten disciplinary motion towards a lawyer who refuses to stick to such name, on condition that the matter requires interpretation of the rights of residents to entry justice assured by the Structure.”
The court docket famous that for the reason that applicant Naeem Bukhari filed an affidavit, stating that his counsel was forcibly stopped by the IHCBA’s elected representatives, and sought a counter-affidavit from the IHCBA president and the secretary.
It could be famous that Mr Bukhari in his utility claimed that “quite a few senior counsels together with the undersigned have been stopped on the major entrance and regardless of their greatest efforts weren’t allowed to proceed the courtrooms on the reassurance by the IHCBA president that the judges of the IHC had been knowledgeable prematurely, who had in flip assured that no antagonistic order could be handed on the mentioned day.”
He acknowledged that the counsel was “compelled” to not tender an look and the IHCBA president’s “categorical assurance” that no antagonistic motion could be handed for non-appearance delayed the counsel from reaching the courtroom, the place the reader knowledgeable that the petition had already been dismissed.
Printed in Daybreak, Might twenty fourth, 2024