LAHORE, April 26: The chief justice of the Lahore High Court urged the judicial officers of the province on Saturday to dispose of the pending cases at the earliest.

He was speaking the oath-taking ceremony of the Punjab Judicial Officers Association (PJOA) here. Almost all district and sessions judges of the province attended.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Hussain Chaudhry said if the pending cases were not off-loaded, there would be no justification even for the provision of resources at present being utilized by the judiciary.

He said the subordinate courts in the province disposed of 880,000 cases during the last year which was a record. “But the judiciary can not ignore its utmost duty of making an optimal use of the available resources,” the CJ said.

He asked the DSJs to make projects for improving the working of judiciary in the province and assured that their proposals would be considered and implemented.

According to the chief justice, the judiciary in the country was not facing scarcity of the resources.

The subordinate judiciary should not bother about the administrative impediments emerging out of red-tapism and should perform its duty with the sole aim of providing speedy justice.

He further asked the DSJs to avoid giving unnecessary adjournments in family, rent and bail matters.

The CJ urged the judicial officers to learn the use of computer and improve their interpersonal skills.

Earlier, the CJ administered oath to the newly-elected members of the PJOA.

In his welcome speech, PJOA’s president Riazul Hassan Alvi said the subordinate judiciary had developed a sense of protection following the steps initiated by the CJ.

He assured that all the judicial officers would work to the best of their potential to provide speedy justice to the litigants and would live up to the expectations of the CJ.

The in charge of access to justice programme, Shaukat Ali Zaidi, said that Rs7 billion would be made available to the LHC during the next three years.

According to Mr Zaidi, this amount would be utilized to improve working conditions in the courts, enhancement in the pay package, provision of transport facilities to the judicial officers, acquisition of information technology and training of the judges in this regard.

He claimed that so far Rs400 million had already been released to the LHC administration for construction of 78 buildings.