21 lawyers’ plea to restore licences rejected

Judicial remand extended for four accused of IHC attack

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) rejected the plea of 21 lawyers to restore their licences over a misconduct case and granted more time to the Islamabad High Court Bar Association (IHCBA) to identify the accused involved in vandalising the IHC building.

A larger bench of IHC headed by Chief Justice Athar Minallah heard the misconduct case against 21 lawyers in the IHC attack case on Monday. Justice Minallah remarked that all bars had admitted this incident should not have happened and condemned it, adding that the attackers were not outsiders but members of the legal fraternity.

Advocate Shoaib Shaheen pleaded that the lawyers who had no connection with the incident shouldn't be punished. He contended that the first information report (FIR) of the incident had been registered and the nominated accused were arrested.

The chief justice said that the bar had to take a decision regarding what to do to stop such practices in the future. Shaheen argued that the bar had condemned the incident, adding that it was creating an impression that the judiciary was weakening the lawyers.

To this, the bench said that the bar itself should name the accused involved in the incident. The court also rejected the lawyers’ request to form a committee comprising senior lawyers to address the matter, commenting that all lawyers' organisations had condemned the incident.

Justice Minallah stated that a constitutional institution was kept non-functional the entire day by violent protesters. He said that the court trusts bars due to which it had neither formed any joint investigation team (JIT) nor has it set up a committee.

He added that if the bars wanted to save the accused then they should inform the bench. The court granted more time to the bar and adjourned the hearing of the case.

Meanwhile, an anti-terrorism court (ATC) extended the judicial remand of four lawyers booked in the IHC vandalism case. ATC Judge Raja Jawwad Abbas Hasan presided over the case on Monday.

The prosecutor Mian Amir Sultan Goraya did not appear before the court, owing to which the hearing on post-arrest bails of suspects could not be conducted. Therefore, the ATC extended judicial remands of all four lawyers and adjourned the hearing until April 1. Notably, the court had also rejected the bail pleas of the law practitioners in the last hearing.

NAB directed to share references

An accountability court (AC) on Monday instructed the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to share copies of reference with the accused, including former chairman Capital Development Authority (CDA) Farkhand Iqbal.

AC-II Judge Muhammad Azam Khan heard the graft reference against Iqbal and others filed by the anti-corruption body. The co-accused former CDA director-general Sarwar Sindhu, Syed Tehseen Akhter, Abdul Aziz Qazi, Mehboob Ali, Masood ur Rehman, Raheem Khan and Sher Zaman appeared before the court.

However, the court granted a one-day exemption from the hearing to Iqbal. The defence lawyer pleaded that the copies of reference against the accused had not been shared with them. The court instructed NAB to provide the reference copies and adjourned the hearing till April 13.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 30^th, 2021.