HYDERABAD, Oct 5: The former judge of the Supreme Court and a member of the government-backed committee for welfare of women prisoners, Justice (rtd) Nasir Aslam Zahid, has stressed the need for judicial activism to provide quick justice.

He was talking to journalists after inauguration of a free legal aid office for women and juveniles at the judicial complex here on Wednesday. Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali of the Sindh High Court inaugurated the office. Others who were also present on the occasion were Justice Mohammad Moosa K. Leghari, Sindh IG Prisons Brig Ayaz Mughni and Prison Chief Muzaffar Alam Siddiqi.

He said that judicial activism was necessary to improve the rate of disposal of cases. He called for case and time management techniques to dispose of cases quickly.

“Judges need to sit for extra time to clear the backlog. I used to sit till late in the night because I believe in provision of speedy justice to people,” he said.

Justice Zahid said that advocates must avoid taking adjournments and if they want to do something they should give extra time to courts.

He was of the view that in every country things improved from the top. “If the chief justice is conservative then it will have an impact on judiciary,” he believed.

Justice Zahid said that judges did not have enough time to dispose huge number of cases quickly. He said that he had spoken to the Sindh High Court chief justice that judges should be allowed to go to prisons to hold trials there.

He gave an example of the Indian Supreme Court’s chief justice who had allowed judges to hold trials in the prisons. India managed to release 8,000 prisoner this way, he said.

Justice Zahid suggested that the Pakistan government should bind the advocates from the offices of advocate general or attorney general to visit jails and obtain details from prisoners.

He said that he had run a legal aid system on ad-hoc basis which did not work.

He then decided to set up a permanent legal aid office with availability of lawyers. He said that such offices would also be established in Sukkur and Larkana.

He said that according to the 1993 verdict of the Supreme Court, a prisoner who had no counsel could file a writ to seek legal counselling at the state’s expense. He said that he agreed with an Indian court’s ruling that non-availability of funds and resources was no excuse to refuse counselling.

He said that he wanted to open 130 courts but was informed by the chief minister that funds were not available.

Justice Zahid said that the government could extend his project to adult male prisoners.