Highly eventful and controversial
Chief justices of the Supreme Court have been removed before him, but none made a comeback. Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry did it twice, by galvanizing the bench, the bar, the elite, the civil society and the hoi polloi behind him in a nationwide movement, first against the military dictator and then a non-obliging PPP dispensation. This was tremendous transformation for someone who for not an inconsiderable period of time himself was a PCO judge and also sat on the bench that rubberstamped the coup-maker Musharraf’s license to rule as he pleased, with a carte blanche to amend the constitution. To the extent, his populism and his deft use of the media, had by 2007 established his persona as synonymous with the independence of judiciary in the country.
But after Dec 11, 2013, there aren’t going to be any comebacks. He shall don his judge’s robe for one last time, and from the next morning Justice Tassaduq Hussain Jilani shall replace him in Court No 1. Having served as Pakistan’s CJ for the longest, Iftikhar Chaudhry’s shadow shall remain for far longer, for his stint was anything but uneventful – especially after his politically inspired removal in early 2007. Whether he would be remembered fondly as someone who launched judicial activism in this country like nobody’s business, making the high and mighty not just bow but tremble and cringe before the SC’s majesty, or a populist with a supersized ego, only time will tell. But one thing is certain: from his acme in popularity from 2007 to 2009, i.e. until his second coming, he had fallen in public esteem by the time he left. This is reflected in the bar for a very large part publicly distancing itself from him, especially those luminaries who were in the vanguard of the movement to restore him, and also in the reference filed against him by the Lahore High Court Bar Association in the Supreme Judicial Council. On the home stretch to his superannuation, there was one controversy too many. It involved his son. If nothing else, juxtaposing independence of judiciary with customary investigation of his son’s indiscretions was a difficult to defend stance.
Even so, Justice Chaudhry is ensured of a spot as one of the most important figures in Pakistan’s judicial history. It would be a travesty if the positive aspect of his activism disappears with his departure. Ironically, to such an extreme he took it, treading the same overzealous path too would ultimately be hazardous.
