ISLAMABAD: “Welcome to the 21st century,” said Chief Justice of Pakistan Asif Saeed Khosa while pointing towards fellow judges as well as lawyers’ representatives at the launch of the court’s new portal that hosts e-court/video link, a new website as well as a state-of-the-art research centre on Thursday.

The litigant-friendly initiatives or what Justice Mushir Alam described it as “justice seekers friendly court environment” is aimed at transformation of the Supreme Court through the information communication technology (ICT).

“Unless we abreast ourselves of education and latest trends, which the modern world is studying, we will lag behind and will never be able to compete,” observed the chief justice.

The Supreme Court IT committee under the supervision of Justice Mushir Alam and Justice Mansoor Ali Shah collaborated with the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) to establish the live video link between the principal seat and its four branch registries. It is already paying dividends by making it cost-effective for lawyers and litigants to participate in case proceedings via their nearest registry instead of travelling to Islamabad.

Nadra also helped the Supreme Court launch its new website.

The chief justice also distributed shields and certificates among Nadra Chairman Usman Yousuf Mobeen, his team and the Supreme Court officers.

New tools have been introduced in the modern website featuring online case search with the provision of complete history of any case of the court. A new ‘judgment search’ and a ‘cause list search’ have also been introduced in which users will be able to use multiple search parameters to help study the important case law with the ability to print in a PDF format. Other features include important news highlights, museum gallery, judge profiles and a photo gallery highlighting the architectural marvel of the Supreme Court building.

The new initiative will help judges hear court proceedings from the principal seat for any branch registry. To date, 138 cases have been heard using the video link in a short span of five weeks from all four registries. The recent New Judicial Year event was also broadcast live to all four registries using this system.

The new website has been built from the ground-up with the end-users in mind - judges, advocates and most importantly the litigants. The primary goal is to guarantee the ease of litigation as per the vision of the chief justice.

Earlier, Justice Mushir Alam explained that at present we have dedicated Courtroom No 5 as the video link/e-court but soon all the five courtrooms in the Supreme Court will be connected with the video link system.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2019