Judicial matters: Eight additional SHC judges sworn in

KARACHI:

Sindh High Court Chief Justice Mushir Alam administered oath to the eight recently appointed additional judges of the SHC on Saturday.

The judges have been appointed for a period of one year following the approval of President Asif Ali Zardari. On Thursday, the president on the advice of the prime minister, appointed district and sessions judges Shaukat Ali Memon, Ashraf Jehan, Shahnawaz Tariq, Abdul Maalik Gaddi, Hassan Feroze and lawyers Nazar Akber, Junaid Ghaffar and Zafar Ahmed Rajput as additional judges of the high court. The oath-taking ceremony was attended by the judges of the Supreme Court and the SHC, senior lawyers, government law officers and families of the newly-appointed judges.

Female judge

Justice Ashraf Jehan is the fourth female judge appointed to the high court, according to the data available online on the history of the court since 1969.

Room still vacant

With the recent appointments, the number of judges in the provincial high court has increased to 32, but there is still a shortage of eight judges to fill the sanctioned strength of 40.

Talking to journalists, CJ Alam said that more appointments would be made within the next two months to meet the requirement. After the appointments, he said, the number of judges at the SHC’s Hyderabad and Sukkur circuit benches has been increased from two to four.

But, two judges would be performing their duties at the Larkana circuit bench.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 1^st, 2013.