Appointment to SHC: Judicial commission meets today to consider 10 names

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Those nominated include five district and sessions judges. PHOTO: EXPRESS/FILE

KARACHI: The judicial commission will meet today in Islamabad to consider the appointment of 10 judicial officers as lawyers as additional judges to the Sindh High Court, Tribune has learnt.

Chief Justice of Pakistan Tassaduq Hussain Jillani will preside over the meeting, which will also be attended by the federal law minister, the attorney general, SHC chief justice Maqbool Baqar and the provincial advocate-general.

Currently, the high court has a working strength of 29 judges against the sanctioned strength of 40. According to officials, SHC CJ Baqar had forwarded the names of 10 judicial officers and lawyers to fill the vacancies as additional judges for a period of one year.

Those nominated include five district and sessions judges – Abdur Rasheed Soomro, Abdul Ghani Soomro, Saghir Zaidi, Lal Mohammad Khairo and Ghulam Qadir Leghari. The lawyers include former SHC Bar Association secretary Shahab Sarki, Iqbal Kalhoro, Advocate KK Agha, Amir Raza Naqvi and Hasan Akbar.

The judicial commission is set to meet today in Islamabad to ponder over the names. “Once the judicial commission approves the names, they will be sent to the parliamentary committee on the appointment of judges to the superior courts to give its consent,” said an official. “Afterwards, the names will be sent to the president for approval on the advice of the prime minister.”
Last year, eight additional judges were appointed to the high court for a period of one year with a view to overcome the dearth of workforce in the superior judiciary of the province.

Retiring in the future
The SHC will lose seven judges in the next five years, unless service periods of some of the additional judges are extended. SHC’s Justice Nisar Muhammad Sheikh will retire on November 17 this year, while Justice Hasan Feroze’s retirement is due on August 1, 2015.

SHC’s pusine judge Justice Faisal Arab is also due to retire on November 11, 2017. However, there are chances of his elevation to the apex court.

In year 2017, the SHC is set to lose another three judges – Justice Sadiq Hussain Bhatti, Justice Syed Muhammad Farooq Shah and Shahnawaz Tariq. Justice Abdul Rasool Memon will retire in 2018.

Published in GNN & Tribune, May 8th, 2014.