Undeniably, all these questions reflect the lack of trust Pakistanis have in the justice system of the country
ISLAMABAD: Last week, I had the opportunity to visit a few prestigious educational institutions, including Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Law College, Larkana, in the upper region of Sindh.
To my utter surprise, wherever I went to deliver a lecture, the audience who were mostly educationists, academicians, writers, intellectuals, human rights activists, political science and law students, always asked me one question in many different ways: “Is there justice in Pakistan? Does justice exist in our Pakistani society? Don’t you think that justice is a far cry for the common man in our society? How can we say we have a justice system when innocent people are pretty much forced into pleading guilty for a crime they did not commit?”
Undeniably, all these questions reflect the lack of trust Pakistanis have in the justice system of the country. The idea of providing justice to every citizen is crucial for the functioning of any society or state. In Pakistan, our justice system is massively flawed. Despite efforts made to remedy this state of affairs, they are clearly inadequate as injustice can be found everywhere in our society. But the fact is that we should keep working towards and ensuring that our justice system is constantly upgraded. That people are questioning the efficacy of this system goes a long way in correcting wrongs. After all, the first step to solving a problem is to identify and understand the problem.
Those who speak of the Constitution, constitutionalism, judicial independence or technicalities, must also reflect upon the above-mentioned questions and play their part so that people get justice in the earnest sense.
Hashim Abro
Published in The Express Tribune, January 2nd, 2015.
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