ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) is likely to be shifted to a new building on Constitution Avenue in G-5 next month.

Sources privy to the development told Dawn that the shifting process was scheduled to commence during the last week of December, however, the contractor failed to meet the deadline of handing over the premises for varied reasons.

According to sources, delay in the shipment of information technology-related equipment was another reason for the delay.

The sources, however, said the installation of necessary equipment, furniture and other gadgets would be completed by next month after which the IHC administration would start transferring record to the new building.

The administration has already devised the strategy of shifting voluminous judicial record, decided and pending petitions to the newly-constructed building.

In 2012, the Capital Development Authority had approved allotment of five acres for the IHC building.

Previously, the construction work on the new IHC building had hit snag in April 2015 when the allegations related to lack of transparency in the pre-qualification of the contractor firm ‘Interhome’ came to the fore.

The contract was cancelled for not being in accordance with rules of Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (Pepra).

At present, the IHC is functioning in a building in G-10, which was originally intended to house the district courts. It is expected the present building of the IHC will be handed over to the Sessions Division (East) of Islamabad.

The sessions division (West) of Islamabad will be shifted to the newly-built District Court Complex in a couple of months as the building is being furnished these days.

Published in Dawn, December 26th, 2022