The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Wednesday postponed the hearing on a petition seeking a format for appointment of judges from rural areas after one of the judges, hearing the case, cited conflict of interest.
Justice Muhammad Athar Saeed refused to hear the constitutional petition, filed by senior lawyer Advocate Ghulam Mustafa Lakho, saying that he was a member of judges’ appointment committee of the SHC and therefore could not hear the petition.
The SHC division bench, comprising Justice Muhammad Ather Saeed and Justice Aqeel Ahmed Abbasi, was hearing the petition regarding implementation of a specific format on appointment of judges belonging to rural areas of Sindh in the apex court and ignoring deserving candidates from the rural areas of the province.
The petitioner had submitted that after the abolition of one-unit and reorganisation of provinces in their own position in the country in 1970, a format was set regarding the appointment of judges in apex and lower courts, wherein lawyers and judges from rural areas as well as women and minorities were given a chance to be appointed as judges in the apex court. However, no written agreements were made but there was an understanding and common convention on appointments of judges. Initially, it was followed for sometime but later the format was not implemented.
“According to the agreement, the Supreme Court was bound to appoint eight judges from Punjab, five from Sindh and one each from Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Sindh and Balochistan high courts were bound to appoint judges on seventy percent from urban and thirty percent from rural areas, respectively, but the arrangement is not being followed and deserving candidates not being given proper chances to be appointed as judges in SHC.”
Stating that deserving candidates, including women and minority members, are being ignored with political interference one of the main hurdles, the plaintiff submitted that there is no proper system in the SHC to appoint judges from rural areas. “The judges appointed from rural areas are retired in two to three years but judges from urban centres serve for more than a decade,” he added.
Citing principle secretaries of president and Sindh governor and federal and provincial law secretaries as respondents, the petitioner pleaded the court that a set format of appointment of judges of Supreme Court and SHC be implemented and deserving candidates of rural areas be considered for the judges’ posts in apex courts.
