The lawyers on Monday continued to observe strike on the call of Punjab Bar Council (PbBC) against the arrest of their colleagues in the wake of attack on the Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC).
A statement issued by PbBC Vice Chairman Chaudhry Shahnawaz Ismail last week had said that no lawyer would appear in the courts from Monday. It had further said that no police official would be allowed to enter the court premises in uniform.
Meanwhile, senior members of the legal fraternity on Monday issued an open letter to the Pakistan Bar Council unequivocally condemning the December 11 riots at the PIC. In the letter, lawyers of the Supreme Court underscored their anguish at the ‘inconceivable and unconscionable’ move to attack a hospital irrespective of reasons, provocations or motivations.
Recalling the legal community’s obligation to respect and abide by the law as well as due legal process, they denounced the ‘degeneration of a conflict leading to violence’ and regretted how it ‘brought disrepute to the legal profession as a whole and humiliated the legal fraternity’.
In open letter, SC senior lawyers condemn ‘deplorable’ attack on hospital
The letter’s signatories, which include some of the most recognisable and respected names in the legal fraternity, underscored that although everyone enjoys the constitutional right to protest, demonstrations and strikes by bar councils and bar associations that hinder court proceedings undermine Pakistani citizens’ constitutional right to justice and the lawyers’ obligation to their clients as well as the judicial system.
“We also note with regret that the Pakistan Bar Council and different bar associations have not condemned this incident in clear and unequivocal terms,” the statement noted.
‘We expect that strict disciplinary action will be taken immediately against all licensed lawyers who participated in this unfortunate incident and are penalized by the Pakistan Bar Council as the apex regulatory authority of the legal profession for having grossly breached canons of professional conduct.”
The lawyers also called upon the PBC, the bar councils, and other lawyers’ associations to take affirmative steps to introspect and engage in immediate self-accountability. “We must not become apologists for those amongst us misconducting themselves but to hold them to account and set the standards by seeking legal recourse in respect of any injustice we perceive is done to members of our fraternity but not by way of acting as a mob,” they added in the letter.
