MUZAFFARABAD: Legal practitioners of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) have warned of complete boycott of judicial work as well as a demonstration in the federal capital if the long due appointments of judges in the region’s High Court are not made within one month.

The warning came through a resolution, adopted by the top office bearers of the AJK supreme court and AJK high court bar associations as well as the bar associations of different districts and tehsils, at a meeting in the lakeside city of Mirpur.

AJK Bar Council vice chairman Fayyaz Haider Nawabi was also present on the occasion.

“The authorities concerned [in Islamabad and Muzaffarabad] should make appointments against the [eight] vacant posts of judges in the high court within one month in accordance with the Constitution, relevant laws and principle of merit,” demanded the resolution.

“During this month lawyers will boycott judicial work only on Thursdays as a mark of symbolic protest over the inordinate delay. However, after one month they will go on complete strike followed by a demonstration at D-Chowk in Islamabad,” it added.

With a sanctioned strength of nine judges, the AJK high court has been functioning with only one judge – Chief Justice Sadaqat Hussain Raja - since May this year due to which the old and fresh petitions cannot be taken up, to the detriment of the lawyers and litigants alike.

Between Nov 2019 and July 2020, six HC judges, one of them a sitting CJ, were sent packing by the AJK apex court through two separate but almost identical verdicts on account of some “technical mistakes” in their appointment process, leaving the high court with only three judges as against its sanctioned strength of 9.

Of the three judges, one retired on attaining superannuation on March 22 this year and the other died of brain hemorrhage on May 3. Justice Sadaqat, who was thus left as the only judge, was elevated initially as acting and later as permanent CJ.

According to the AJK Constitution, the apex court judges are appointed by the AJK president on the advice of the AJK Council chairman – the prime minister of Pakistan - and after consultations with the AJK CJ. Appointment of judges in the high court involves additional consultations with its chief justice.

As Justice Raja Saeed Akram was sworn in as AJK’s permanent CJ on May 18 this year, two judges were directly appointed in the apex court within a week to complete its sanctioned strength of three.

However, there has been no progress with regard to the appointments in the high court despite the passage of nearly four months after the installation of the new government in AJK, led by the PTI.

Speaking at the Mirpur event, Babar Ali Khan, president of the high court bar association, regretted that the governments in Islamabad and Muzaffarabad were paying no attention to this important issue.

He pointed out that the dictum laid down by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in the famous al-Jihad Trust case which was also declared applicable to AJK’s judiciary by the AJK supreme court, made it clear that “the permanent vacancies occurring in the office of the CJ and judges should normally be filled in immediately not later than 30 days but a vacancy occurring before the due date on account of death or for any reason should be filled in within 90 days on permanent basis.”

“But ironically no one seems to be bothered about the wilful infringement of the apex court judgment in AJK, where posts have been lying vacant for more than a year,” he said.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2021