PHC questions Dispute Resolution Councils establishment

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday questioned the establishment of dispute resolution councils (DRCs) and asked the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Advocate General to explain were these not parallel courts.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Muhammad Daud Khan summoned the Advocate General (AG) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Abdul Latif Yousafzai, and asked him to explain the legal position of DRCs that are functioning like parallel courts in the police stations.
To be able to reply to the court’s query, the AG sought time. He submitted that if the DRCs are having statutory backing, then the high court would proceed with the case accordingly and can stop
the DRCs from working if
they lack legal status.
The court took notice of the issue and sought an answer from the AG about the legal position of the DRCs in a writ petition of Qaiser Khan, a resident of Hayatabad, who had challenged the establishment of the DRCs and also the proceedings initiated against him on a complaint in the DRC located at the West Cantonment Police Station.
During the course of hearing, the PHC chief justice observed that the court had taken notice of the DRCs in February, 2015 after knowing about it through the media.
He said the court had issued notices to the officials concerned through the registrar of the high court. They were asked to explain the legal position of the DRCs and the authority under which the cases were being decided at the police stations.
The petitioner claimed in the petition that he first received a notice through Hayatabad Police Station to appear before the DRC at the West Cantonment Police Station. “When I refused to appear before the DRC and attend baseless and frivolous proceedings, one of its members warned me of dire consequences and said I will have to pay the amount claimed by the complainant in the DRC,” he added.
The petitioner stated that he told the member of the DRC that if the complainant had any claim against him he could go to the civil court against him.
In January 2014, the police authorities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa set up the first Dispute Resolution Council (DRC) at the Gulbahar Police Station in Peshawar in an effort to modernise the Pakhtun Jirga and provide it support from the police station concerned.
Another DRC started working a few months later for the Rural Circle of Peshawar. Presently, there are over 50 DRCs all over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with at least one body at the tehsil (sub-division) level.
There are superior panels in the DRCs which hear the cases already decided by the regular panels but are not acceptable to one or the other party.
The members of these bodies work voluntarily in a panel of three for one day a week. The bodies have more impacts as compared to the local jirgas as its offices and jury room are set up inside a police station. A sub-divisional officer (Deputy Superintendent of Police or ASP) is its coordinator and the cops summon the other party when a complainant approaches a DRC.
Presently, six retired judges of the High Court are members of DRCs set up all over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.