Although the British may have left the region some seven decades ago, the burden of their presence is still felt by the country’s judiciary, which has had a hard time making a move away from colonial practices.
Where new legislation has been has been offered time and again since 1947, it seems that instead of nullifying previous standards, much of the country’s contemporary laws have remained grounded in the image of their colonial predecessors.
According to legal experts, these rules, despite going through various amendments, have had little to prescribe in terms of change, while retaining the defining characteristics of their British-era counterparts.
For instance, although significant efforts have been made at the provincial level to introduce separate laws for federal and provincial government employees, there has been little to no change of practice in the regard. The only major differences observed between the obsolete and extant legislation appear to be limited to the naming of the laws and the dates of their passing.
Per details, the Civil Services Conduct, initially introduced in 1942, was changed to the Government Civil Servants (Conduct) Rules, 1964, but still retained more or less the same clauses as the 1942 edict.
Similarly, the West Pakistan Government Servants (Conduct) Rules, was first introduced in 1966, to ostensibly nullify the laws pertaining to the civil servants of Punjab, Sindh, former North-Western Frontier Province and the state of Bahawalpur. However, unsurprisingly, the later edict retained the same clauses as the previous laws it was meant to overhaul, offering nothing new but a change of name.
Where on surface it may appear that much of the colonial rules once introduced by the British to govern the subcontinent would have been eventually replaced by the 1973 Constitution and the 18th Amendment, nothing could be further from the truth.
The Sindh government, which introduced its Civil Servants Conduct Rules in 2008, struggled to put out a set of rules free of colonial influence. Some 61 years after Independence, the new rules still featured the same clauses as the British-devised edict from the days of servitude.
According to former bureaucrat and local politician Syed Sardar Ahmed, the country’s legal system has had a hard time adapting to the significant changes brought by the end of the British rule.
“There is a huge gap in our regulations today, simply because we are not able to end our reliance on older, obsolete pieces of legislation. This is not just limited to laws pertaining to civil servants- even the Pakistan Penal Code is but a repackaged version of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, to most extent,” opined Ahmed.
Speaking on the matter, senior lawyer and former Sindh advocate general Barrister Zamir Ghumro said that there is a severe need to free ourselves from the shackles of our colonial past, and produce laws better suited to the contemporary world.
“There are several laws in place today, like the Criminal Procedure Code and the Police Rules which date back to the 18th century. Similarly, there are various newer laws like the Civil Service Rules which despite being made after Partition still retain a strong colonial flavour. It is the parliament’s job to make sure that these laws are replaced by rulings more relevant to the contemporary world,” Ghumro told The Express Tribune.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 16th, 2020.
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Speaking on the matter, senior lawyer and former Sindh advocate general Barrister Zamir Ghumro said that there is a severe need to free ourselves from the shackles of our colonial past, and produce laws better suited to the contemporary world. "Who will dare for and it needs to have been changed with a new social contract where the commons are ensured to be heard and counted.and not making the commons the football in the court of law in the name of access to justice.