ISLAMABAD: The high courts of Peshawar and Balochistan have collaborated with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the European Union to enhance access to legal aid in the two provinces.

At a workshop concluded in Swat on Wednesday, stakeholders from the justice system in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan discussed challenges and opportunities faced by the District Legal Empowerment Committees (DLECs) functioning in the two provinces.

The participants also formulated recommendations to improve the functioning of these committees to increase synergies between legal aid mechanisms and strengthen the capacity of the legal aid system.

UNDP Pakistan’s Rule of Law Programme partnered with the Peshawar and Balochistan high courts to organise the cross-provincial consultative workshop on issues faced by DLECs in serving their intended function of enabling efficient and effective access to legal aid for local communities, particularly vulnerable groups including women, transgender persons, and children.

The committees were established in 2011 by the Law and Justice Commission of Pakistan (LJCP) to provide legal aid to deserving litigants. The District and Sessions Judge (Zilla Qazi) presides over these committees.

The district judge is entrusted with receiving applications for legal aid, appointing panels of lawyers to provide legal aid at the district level, referring legal aid cases to DLEC panel lawyers, allocating funds for free legal representation, and monitoring the quality of legal aid services.

Designed to enhance access to justice and legal aid in Pakistan, the optimal utilisation of the committees as a legal aid solution is challenged by access issues impacted by poverty, illiteracy, lack of awareness, cultural and gender barriers, remote locations, and inadequate compensation for lawyers.

Based on the recommendations from the baseline study conducted by UNDP Pakistan’s Rule of Law Programme between August 2021 and March 2022, as part of the EU-funded ‘Deliver Justice Project’, an evaluation of citizens’ access to justice and legal aid in KP and Balochistan highlighted a crucial requirement for enhancing the service delivery of these legal committees.

This enhancement aims to establish more sustainable and easily accessible legal aid services in Pakistan with a focus on marginalised groups, such as women, transgender individuals, and children.

Legal experts recommended revision of committee rules to simplify the process and scrutiny of applications for legal representation; improve coordination and cross-referral between DLECs and other legal aid mechanisms; and revisit their constitution for enhanced efficiency, defining the role of the members of civil society organisations.

Speaking on the occasion, Balochistan High Court’s deputy registrar, Malik Shoaib Sultan, said equal access to justice for all cannot be achieved without strengthening DLECs in making the legal aid more accessible.

“We are optimistic that the recommendations made in this consultative workshop will prove pivotal in enabling more people to approach formal legal systems to seek justice,” he said.

The “Deliver Justice Programme” funded by the EU aims to support reform processes to ensure the delivery of people-centred justice, enhance access to justice for all, particularly women and less privileged groups, and improve service delivery of the security sector in line with constitutional safeguards and international standards in the Merged Districts and Balochistan.

The UNDP Rule of Law Programme is implementing a range of interventions to enhance security and justice sector governance in Pakistan.

Published in Dawn, August 24th, 2023