Acting CJ tells counsel to keep politics out of court
By Khaleeq Kiani
ISLAMABAD, March 16: Acting Chief Justice of Pakistan Javed Iqbal on Friday observed that mix-up of politics with court proceedings always resulted in crisis. He made the observations when a Supreme Court lawyer sought adjournment of a case from a three-member bench on the ground that his colleagues could not reach the court from Multan because of a police blockade of the city.
"When we mix politics with courts, it creates problems," the ACJ observed and asked the counsel to advance some other excuse for the adjournment. The adjournment was, however, granted.
The court was informed that some lawyers were not able to cross police barricades to reach the apex court. The ACJ expressed his displeasure and said the court had issued clear instructions to the administration not to stop representatives of the press and lawyers from coming to the Supreme Court.
On another occasion, the ACJ observed: "Since Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry was heading the bench that previously heard the case, it would be appropriate to adjourn the hearing for a date in office.”
Commenting on a case in which a lawyer did not appear, the ACJ said that present circumstances were such that there was no way out except to adjourn the case.
In the human rights case of Munno Bhil, the additional inspector general of Sindh informed the court that the inspector general did not come for the hearing because of a misunderstanding. He said a television channel reported that apex court's cause-list had been changed because of judicial crisis. At this, the ACJ commented that a lot of things were telecast on televisions and everything was not correct.
He expressed his displeasure over the performance of Sindh police and said that they took no time in taking into custody innocent people but showed no progress in arresting the accused. He criticised the Sindh police for not submitting a report within the time given by the Supreme Court.
He said that had police been as active in arresting criminals as they had been in case of innocent, the people would not have been wandering Supreme Court’s corridors. "We hold open kutcheris for police cases or perform our own work," he added. He said the court did not want a battery of police officers to be in the courtroom but it was also not clear as to who was answerable to whom in the police department.
The court directed the Sindh police to submit a comprehensive report on the issue before the next date of hearing on March 29 after which no more adjournment would be granted.
