The Chief Justice of Lahore High Court (LHC), Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmed said that the establishment’s meddling in the judiciary will end soon.
Speaking on Friday at an event in Rawalpindi, the CJ outlined the first things he did as soon as he took office. “I called an all-court conference and declared that the striking culture would not be accepted. The Punjab judiciary received a directive on May 13 informing them that we will not recognize any calls for strikes. We shall follow the law whether or not a strike is called,” he declared.
Judges on the IHC unanimously agreed on April 24 that intelligence services were “interfering” with their ability to carry out their judicial duties.
Honoring the legal profession as a whole, Justice Ahmed stated that “90% of the lawyers are decent people.”
He disclosed that in Punjab, more than 200,000 cases were submitted and over 300,000 cases were settled, greatly lowering the backlog of unresolved cases.
He brought up the subject of establishment meddling and cited past incidents, beginning with the Maulvi Tamizuddin case. “It would be preferable if the institutions causing these interferences remained anonymous. But for now, the court is carrying out its responsibilities independently,” he claimed.
He told the motivational story of a district judge who resisted such meddling by declaring, “I am not afraid; I will deliver justice without bias.”
Justice Ahmed said he was “immensely proud” of this judge for his boldness.
He also spoke about district judges’ worries over efforts at extortion and meddling.
He urged them to resist giving in to these kinds of pressures, trusting that heavenly direction would sustain them. “The end of establishment meddling in the judiciary is part of my faith,” he said.
