LAHORE: Fakharun Nisa Khokhar, a former judge of the Lahore High Court (LHC) and the president of the bar, passed away on Saturday. She was 80.

Her funeral was offered in a mosque on Abid Majeed Road, Lahore Cantonment, after Maghrib prayers. Several judges and lawyers were among those who attended the funeral.

Khokhar served as judge of the LHC from 1994 to 2004. She had been subjected to discrimination during the military rule of Gen Pervez Musharraf and repeatedly bypassed to deprive her of her right to become chief justice of the LHC. Had the seniority principle been followed in the past, the LHC would have had a woman chief justice and the Supreme Court a woman judge back in 2002-2003 if Justice Khokhar was not bypassed apparently on account of her gender.

After her retirement, she was elected president of the Lahore High Court Bar Association in 2005 and a member of the National Assembly on the ticket of Pakistan People’s Party in 2008.

Published in Dawn, November 6th, 2022