A month ago, The National Assembly giving legal and constitutional cover to the centuries old jirga and panchayat systems in the country had passed a bill named The Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) Bill-2016. The objectives to create the ADR system are to ensure expeditious settlement of some twenty three petty civil and criminal matters before these are taken to formal judicial plat forms and to reduce the burden of litigations on the courts. In reality, the ADR system is the need of hour but it is desperately required to settle the disputes judiciously, neutrally and pragmatically. According to content of the bill, under the ADR system the government, after consultation with the high court, shall notify in the official gazette a panel of neutrals for each district from amongst lawyers, retired Judges of superior and subordinate judiciary, retired civil servants, social workers, ulema, jurists, technocrats and experts and such other persons of repute and integrity having such qualifications and experience as may prescribed. The Neutrals will be appointed as mediators to settle disputes. Under the ADR system the government will notify ADR centers to hear disputes. Complaints will be lodged at an ADR center and it will refer the matter to a ‘Neutral’ or such other person as may be agreed upon by the parties. The dispute will be settled with consent of both disputant parties and there will be no punishment in the disputes to be settled by the ADR system. The composition of panels and the procedure to hear disputes make this institutionalized Jirga system too much different from prevailing Jirga system based on brutality, injustice and prejudice. If the ADR system is implemented honestly, impartially and genuinely, it will work better and would give definitely fruitful results but if didn’t it would revert back with the startling and outrageous consequences for the common people. Though expeditious justice is both a fundamental right of every citizen under Article 9 and a fundamental responsibility of the state under Article 37(d) of the Constitution, yet because of the huge pendency of cases before courts, it is not possible for the judiciary to dispense speedy justice to citizens. Since before 2000, there is an enormous backlog of terrorism cases, criminal cases, civil cases, women and minority rights cases, selective commercial cases, tax cases etc. According to official statistics available up to December 31, 2014, there were 1,754,420 cases pending in the Supreme Court, Federal Shariat Court, High Courts and the district courts in Pakistan. In addition to these cases, official statistical report December 31, 2013 reveals that there 123, 531 pending cases before the various special courts and tribunals (anti-terrorism courts, national accountability courts, banking courts etc.). Thus, the grand total of all cases pending before various courts was 1,900,715 and if the statistics are updated, currently it would be approximately 2.2m cases. Although the old age tradition of jirga or panchayat system existing in all four provinces — Punjab, Balochistan, Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — and in FATA controlled by landlords and feudals is one of the most maligned system for its many flaws and injustices, yet it has been providing significant services to control the law and order situation, especially at a time when the state continues to fail in providing masses with a peaceful environment. It plays a significant role in settling even deadly disputes in rural areas of Pakistan. Embarked upon petty matters, the deadly tribal clashes, which mostly take place in interior Sindh and Balochistan provinces, last for many years and swallow huge number of lives of innocent people of disputant tribes. Mostly in tribal clashes cases are not registered at police stations by the affected families for murders of their relatives because it is considered their dishonour, weakness and cowardice. In the race of assassination in vengeance for assassination, each party tries to equalize the number of casualties. Meanwhile, the role of police is to take away dead bodies from the crime spots for postmortem and to register cases themselves. The police mostly avoid intervening in the feuds. In this way, cases of tribal disputes are not brought to courts. However, courts will not be able to conduct the cases anyway, because there are so many complications in these cases. In most instances, there is a lack of identification of assassins, evidences or witnesses. Therefore, these bloody disputes are settled in Jirgas but regrettably victims are not provided with justice. Viewing this grim state of affairs, the deadly tribal feuds should be included in the list of disputes to be heard and decided by the ADR system. The Neutrals to have vast experience of making honest, judicious and impartial judgments can be helpful in providing the commensurate and quick justice to the victims of the disputes. Because of the existence of corruption and lack of efficiency in investigating, prosecution and detective agencies, they have been making unnecessary delays in legal proceedings of cases. Inordinate delays in trials are the main causes of obstacles in dispensation of justice to the complainant parties. Sometimes, the complainant parties usually take the law into their own hands by indulging in acts of retribution. This has compelled people to resort to Waderas or Sardars to get their disputes settled through Jirgas in rural areas of the country. This is why this Jirga system, the informal judicial form, enjoys strong social acceptance and influence in our rural society. There should be equal representation of female Neutrals in the panels to be formed to hear cases related to women as victimized females can get expeditious and adequate justice. Many of the civil and criminal cases of ordinary nature are concerned to women and most of the women in rural areas avoid reporting their cases due to the male-dominated courts and police stations. As a result, they can’t get justice. Though the ADR system will work under the direct supervision of respective High Courts of the provinces yet to get a success in achieving the targeted objectives of creating the system it is prerequisite that the Neutrals to have good reputation, honest professional track record and immense experience of dealing cases impartially and scrupulously, and honestly should be appointed. The writer is an academic, and can be reached on Twitter @ARShykh