ISLAMABAD: The National Judicial (Policy Making) Committee (NJPMC), a body which works on building capacity of the justice system in order to improve its performance, has emphasised the need for revisiting the National Judicial Policy (NJP), a brainchild of former chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, which was introduced during his tenure amid fanfare.

A meeting of the committee at the Supreme Court building on Saturday reviewed the performance of district judiciary with reference to disposal of cases.

Chief Justice Nasir-ul-Mulk, who presided over the meeting, observed that because it had been more than two years since the NJP had been revised, it should be revisited to further improve the performance of the justice system.

Chief justices of high courts asked to submit recommendations needed to improve the system

He asked the chief justices of high courts to submit recommendations to the committee about measures needed to improve the system.

The NJP was introduced by Justice Chaudhry in 2009 with an objective to improve the image of the judiciary by ridding it (particularly the lower judiciary) of corruption, strengthen the independence of judiciary and eliminate the backlog of cases at all levels.

The policy also envisioned protecting the rights and interests of the poor and downtrodden segments of society, helping break the shackles of cruelty and injustice and ensuring economic growth and social progress in the country.

Chief Justice Mulk said the main challenge being faced by the judiciary was how to tackle increasing litigation and advised the bench and bar to adopt proactive approach for expeditiously deciding the cases. He stressed the need for revisiting strategies in order to meet the challenge.

Currently the Supreme Court is seized with a colossal balance of 22,089 pending cases. That was the reason why the chief justice, while opening the new judicial year on Sept 8, had assured participants of the ceremony that the court was aware of its responsibility of reducing the backlog.

“An effort to eliminate the backlog of cases is underway in the court and efforts would be pursued in future with greater energy and dynamism,” he had said.

He had expressed the hope that by the summer of 2015, the backlog of criminal cases in the apex court would be wiped out and a similar effort would be made to tackle the backlog of constitutional, civil, revenue and other cases.

The committee also reviewed the status of implementation of its recommendations about allocation of additional funds to strengthen district judiciary in terms of human resources and infrastructure.

It recommended that the process of recruitment of staff against the sanctioned posts should be completed as early as possible.

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Mohammad Azam Khan, and the Chief Justice of Supreme Appellate Court of Gilgit-Baltistan, Justice Rana Muhammad Arshad Khan, informed the meeting of the shortage of judges and lack of proper infrastructure, which were adversely affecting the performance of the judiciary.

After deliberations, the committee recommended to the government to allocate the funds needed to strengthen the judiciary of AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan.

It discussed complaints made by district attorneys about their “deficient service structure” and disparity in pay and allowances and recommended to the provincial governments to improve the service structure.

The NJPMC was constituted in 2002 under an ordinance.

Published in Dawn, September 21th, 2014