Daily Times

Seeking an amendment to the Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Act, 1997, a bill was tabled in the Senate on Monday to increase the number of judges in the Supreme Court to 20 – other than the chief justice – to “address the rising number of pending cases”.

The bill titled “Supreme Court (Number of Judges) (Amendment) Act”, 2024, was presented by an independent senator from Balochistan, Mohammad Abdul Qadir. He sought the increase in the number of top court judges from 17 to 21 as “more than 53,000 cases” pending in the apex court.

According to the bill, the number of judges of the top court other than the chief justice shall be 20.

It further stated: “The Supreme Court has four jurisdictions original, appellate, advisory, and review being diverse and demanding, contributing to the continuous accumulation of cases.”

“With economic growth and social changes, the complexity and variety of cases have increase,” it pointed out.

It stressed: “This backlog, combined with the complexities of integrating the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, necessitates more judicial resources.”

Speaking on the floor of the upper house, Senator Abdul Qadir called for appointing “at least 16 judges” to the top court, saying that several constitutional matters were being referred to the top court.

“Larger benches are formed and these judges look into the constitutional matters,” he added.

Not only constitutional cases, but several cases related to financial matters worth billions were also pending in the top court as it does not have time to hear these cases, the senator claimed.

“Our judicial system is lowest on the [global] ranking,” he added.

Federal Minister for Law and Justice Azam Nazeer Tarar also backed the legislation and suggested forwarding the new bill to the relevant committee.

Opposition members opposed the amendment bill, prompting Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar to defend the proposal. “Dismissing the bill without reading it is not a constructive approach`. We have received a request from the Peshawar government to increase the number of judges by ten, despite the fact that the provincial government is run by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). We are still willing to allocate ten additional judges there,” Tarar stated.

PTI Senator Ali Zafar criticised the bill, alleging that it aimed to interfere with the judiciary. “By introducing such bills, there is an attempt to manipulate the judiciary. I have made it clear on behalf of PTI that Senator Abdul Qadir is being used for this purpose. We are willing to increase the number of judges by two, but not more than that,” Zafar said.

Senator Saifullah Abro added that there seemed to be an ulterior motive behind the sudden move to increase the number of judges.