LAHORE, Aug 2: Supreme Court Bar Association President Qazi Muhammad Jameel said here on Tuesday the constitutional guarantees against gender discrimination were of little help in view of the social and cultural taboos that placed women at a disadvantageous position.

Speaking at a seminar sponsored by the AGHS Law Associates on gender-based litigation to be conformed with international human rights’ norms, the SCBA president pointed out that while the superior judiciary had by and large whittled down the rigours of the Hudood laws, the subordinate judiciary continued to be under tremendous pressure from the bigoted sections of society to give judicial pronouncement in some of the cases which should have been struck down as the most atrocious attitude of gender discrimination.

Still, he said, the articles 14, 25 and 26 of the Constitution which enshrined equality of citizens regardless of gender, cast and creed and promised fundamental rights, carried a potential of remedial measures through courts of law. He was of the view that the judiciary was under a major responsibility of ensuring freedom of the people and society from gender bias and discrimination in any of its manifestations.

The SCBA president said frequent intervention of the armed forces had been a major factor in the social, democratic and institutional progress and the superior judiciary had also felt the pressure of successive military rules in failing to prevent law and order.

As for the Hasba Act, as adopted by the NWFP Assembly, Qazi Jameel said if implemented, the law would give absolute powers to the ombudsman in determining the standards of piety and sin and, thus, interfere in the personal life, beliefs and public behaviour of the people. The law, he said, was a blatant violation of the Constitution and fraught with extreme perils of an otherwise traditional society of the province.

Human Right Commission of Pakistan chairperson Asma Jahangir, Musarrat Hilali and Hina Jilani from Pakistan and Prof Savitri Goonesekra and Rangita de Silva from Sri Lanka also shared views at the seminar on the development of the law within South Asian jurisdiction.