Justice Rahim ‘part of bigger conspiracy’

High Court Bar rejects PCO judge’s contempt notices.

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA) on Friday condemned the contempt notices issued by a non-functional judge of the Peshawer High Court, Justice Jahanzeb Rahim, to four sitting judges of the Supreme Court (SC), and carried a unanimous resolution calling for a medical examination to determine his sanity.

The LHCBA general body met only to discuss the issue.

Justice Rahim had issued ‘contempt notices’ on Thursday against four SC judges, summoning them before him on Monday. He and seven others judges, have to appear before the SC in a contempt of court trial on Monday.

The LHCBA demanded the Supreme Court and the president take immediate action against Justice Rahim.

The resolution in support of the SC breaks the pattern. Other bar associates and the Pakistan Bar Council have recently condemned the SC for carrying a resolution supporting Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday and Justice (retried) Rehmat Hussain Jaffery’s re-appointment as ad hoc judges.

The LHCBA leaders belong to the Hamid Khan Group, which had been in the forefront during the lawyers’ movement for the restoration of judges. The LHCBA president, Mian Abdul Quddus said that he did not consider a person facing contempt of court proceedings a judge.

By issuing such notices, he said, Justice Rahim had shown that he was a part of a conspiracy against the judiciary. The lawyers would not accept any illegal actions, he said. Quddus said that it was the responsibility of the legal fraternity to protect the independent judiciary.

Naseer Ahmed Bhutta, the LHCBA secretary and a PML-N MNA, said that the bar did not consider Rahim as a judge. Any order issued by him had no legal value. He has made a mockery of the judiciary by issuing such orders Bhutta added.

The LHCBA members asserted that the lawyers’ movement had helped restore democracy in the country. They said it was only because of the lawyers’ movement that the exiled political leaders had returned to the country.

Former civil and military bureaucrats, who were facing corruption charges, were responsible for ‘hatching a conspiracy’ against the judiciary and Justice Rahim appeared to be a part of their plot, they alleged.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 19^th, 2011.