Criminal justice system yet to improve: SC judge

One-week refresher course for district and session judges.

ISLAMABAD:

Change is constant - times are changing and so is the law in the form of amendments, but Pakistan’s criminal justice system is yet to improve.

This was the opinion of Supreme Court Judge Nasirul Mulk on the conclusion of one-week refresher course on “Management of Sessions Trial” for additional district and sessions judges from all over Pakistan, said a press release issued by the Federal Judicial Academy, which organised the course in Islamabad.

“The first and the foremost objective of the law are welfare and betterment of society. It is to provide justice to common man,” Justice Mulk said. He added the criminal justice system, which was working satisfactorily, has succumbed to the increased workload.

He said there is a lot talk about speedy justice but no one thinks about speedy trials, which is one of the main obstacles in the way of speedy justice. He added the huge number of pending cases in the country was partly due to shortage of judges.

He asked the trainee judges to give suggestions for improving the working of the Criminal Justice System in the country.

Earlier, academy’s Director-General Parvaiz Ali Chawla, during his welcome speech, gave an overview of the course. He said they designed the course to update and enlighten the trainees so that they may go back in the field and provide “speedy justice” to litigants and protect the interests of the downtrodden people. Twenty additional district and session judges, including two female judges from Sindh, were awarded certificates in the ceremony.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 18th, 2011.