Govt tells Senate it spent Rs8.6m in three years

Fund aims to provide relief in hardship cases, human rights violations

ISLAMABAD: Tens of thousands of poor litigants are probably unaware of what the government claims it is spending on their legal assistance and rehabilitation.

Over the last three years, the government said that the law and justice ministry allocated Rs8.6 million for free legal assistance to needy litigants.



According to a statement submitted by the ministry in the Senate during the last session, Rs4.5 million was allocated during the financial year 2012-13, Rs2.1 million during 2013-14 and Rs2 million during 2014-15 for this legal assistance. But the ministry did not say how many litigants benefited from the money.



The ministry said the purpose of this fund is to provide urgent relief in hardship and deserving cases, as well as in cases of human rights violations, which – for the purpose of this fund – include kidnapping, rape, police encounters, arrests of women, extrajudicial deaths and torture.

The fund is disbursed in three categories. These include financial assistance to deserving cases for providing legal aid subject to maximum of Rs10,000 per case; assistance of maximum of Rs20,000 for rehabilitation of the victims and families of human rights violation and assistance of maximum Rs10,000 in hardship and deserving cases for rehabilitation of persons permanently incapacitated or their family.



When it comes to women, there is a Family Protection and Rehabilitation Centre for Women (FPRCW) in Islamabad which is ‘successfully’ working for the last 12 years, according to the ministry. “The FPRCW has a separate unit called shelter home which offers support to victims of violence round the clock,” the ministry said.

The centre has dealt 16,783 cases during 2014-15 in which 4,031 cases are of counseling, 300 cases were referred to law officers, 2,623 were given medical aid, 285 given vocational training, 24 cases of reconciliation. The ministry said it provided services to 6,675 cases at shelter homes but did not explain exactly what the services were. The budgetary allocation during the period was Rs150,000 whereas Rs250,000 have been allocated for the year 2015-16.

“This amount is inadequate,” said the Supreme Court Bar Association President Ali Zafar while talking to The Express Tribune.  “People are not aware of the legal assistance programme while the amount being paid is also inadequate,” he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 25^th,  2016.