On the fingertips: Upload laws online, says SC

Says people should know about laws applicable to them


Hasnaat Malik January 20, 2015
Says people should know about laws applicable to them. PHOTO: AFP

ISLAMABAD:


The Supreme Court summoned federal and provincial law secretaries on Wednesday to set a timeframe for publishing online the Constitution, all constitutional amendments, acts, ordinances, rules, regulations, bylaws and other statutory instruments with a translation in Urdu or any provincial language.


The initiative has been taken to allow easy access to the law. “The people of Pakistan (should) be given full information about the laws applicable to them,” says the Supreme Court order.

On Monday, a three-judge bench, headed by Justice Jawwad S Khawaja, took up the suo motu case regarding the errors in legal books and journals. The errors are found in different books related to Contract Act 1872, Manual of Intellectual Property Laws, Printing Ordinance 2000 and Punjab Consumer Protection Laws, among others.

The court directed law secretaries of the federal and provincial governments to make sure that the entire statute book is made in hard form and also put on the websites of the law departments.

The Supreme Court’s bench has observed that printing mistakes in the law books and journals lead to drastic consequences, causing loss to either of parties in litigation. However, a senior official of the Supreme Court maintained that it will be very difficult for the federal government to place 5,000 laws on its website.

The court noted that though it had referred the matter affecting the administration of justice to the bar councils no actual steps were taken.

During the hearing, a representative of the law ministry admitted that the ministry has failed to place all the laws with translation in national language on its website. Likewise, Additional Advocate General Balochistan stated that there is no website of the provincial law department.

Justice Khawaja remarked that a debate was under way regarding the elimination of terrorism but the federal government has failed to place the anti-terrorism law on the website. Similarly, up till now, the government did not provide the list of outlawed organisations to the media houses.

Another member of the bench Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan said it is the duty of the executive to make arrangements for publishing or printing the legal books so that citizens could be aware in this regard, adding that people will follow the laws through awareness.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 20th, 2015.

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