ISLAMABAD: Peshawar High Court (PHC) Chief Justice Waqar Ahmed Seth has said that the judiciary is under constant scrutiny of society and it is facing several challenges.

He was speaking as the chief guest at the Registrars Conference held in a local hotel here on Saturday.

He emphasised that a successful judicial system is possible only through full dedication of judicial officers.

He marked the conference as the beginning of a new chapter in the already strong bonds of friendship, cooperation and mutual respect between courts of all the four provinces of Pakistan and those of Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. He said they were moving from the regional to national level.

He reiterated and pressed upon the requirement of a responsive judicial administration with contemporary governance approaches that respond to the needs of society and uses intelligent technologies to deliver judicial services in the most efficient manner.

Justice Seth says judiciary working under constant societal watch

The chief justice informed the conference that the PHC had conceptualised a strategy for reforms and development in the judicial system with the goals of improving the quality of court services, increasing access to justice, improving the infrastructure, ensuring human resource development, using information technology for service delivery improvement and ensuring speedy and affordable justice.

He appreciated the organisers and participants of the conference for sharing their valuable experiences, saying that such conferences should continue in the future for sharing experiences, promoting coordination between high courts and developing common approaches to deal with the huge backlog of cases the country is facing.

The first-ever Registrars Conference was organised by the Peshawar High Court with the support of the United Nations Development Programme — Pakistan. The conference was attended by registrars and delegates from high courts from all the four provinces, Azad and Jammu Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.

Speaking on the occasion, the PHC registrar mentioned that several initiatives had been taken and reforms made under the leadership of Chief Justice Seth.

All the registrars and delegates deliberated upon governance issues related to judicial administration and shared their experiences, best practices, success stories and learned lessons for developing common guidelines and adoption of analytical activities for mutual learning and replication.

The areas dilated upon in the conference included: High Court Administration, District Judiciary Administration, Monitoring and Inspection, Financial Management, Use of Information Technology and Automation, Court/Case Mana­gement, and Training and Dev­elopment of staff.

The recommendations and viewpoints of the registrars of all the high courts will be documented and shared through a formal report.

Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2020