Justice Bandial will be 4th Cambridge alumni to act as CJP

LAHORE: Incoming Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Umar Ata Bandial, will be the fourth Cambridge University alumni to head the country’s court system.

He will be sworn in on a rather unique date of February 2, 2022 (2-2-22) at the age of 63 years, four months and 16 days for one year, six months and 25 days until September 16, 2023.

Before Justice Umar Ata Bandial, his predecessors who graduated from the 813-year-old Cambridge University include Pakistan’s first-ever-Chief Justice, Sir Mian Abdul Rashid (1889-1981), who graduated 109 years ago in 1912, country’s fourth top arbiter, Alvin Robert Cornelius (1903-1991), who got his LLM degree in Law and Justice some 94 years ago in 1926 with fundamental thesis on Western law, and 26th Chief Justice, Asif Saeed Khosa (born 1954), who completed his specialisation in Public International Law before called to the Bar in 1979 at London’s Lincoln’s Inn, founded in 1422.

Research conducted by the “Jang Group and Geo Television Network” shows that the prestigious Cambridge University, which is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world after Oxford and the world's fourth-oldest surviving university, has also produced 14 British and one Pakistani prime minister Khawaja Nazimud Din, who had attended the Trinity Hall at Cambridge University for his MA English degree, before practicing Law to become a Barrister-at-Law in England.

By the way, before he became famous for experimenting with an apple to come up with his revolutionary theories of motion and gravity, Sir Isaac Newton, was a student at Trinity College in the University of Cambridge too.

Another noted Cambridge alumni in Pakistan's context is Aitzaz Ahsan, eminent jurist and former Federal Interior/ Law and Education Minister/ Leader of the House in the Senate.

The 76-year-old Aitzaz had received an LLM degree from the Downing College, Cambridge, much before he had represented three former Pakistani Premiers Nawaz Sharif, Benazir Bhutto and Yusuf Raza Gilani in various court cases, besides serving as a solicitor to ex-President Asif Ali Zardari.

Coming back to Justice Umar Ata Bandial, he also qualified as Barrister-at-Law from Lincoln’s Inn, London, which has the distinction of grooming three Pakistani Chief Justices (Justice Fazal-e-Akbar in 1930, Justice Ajmal Mian in 1957, and Justice Asif Saeed Khosa in 1979).

It is imperative to note that apart from Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, former Pakistani president and premier Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was also trained as a barrister at Lincoln's Inn, prior to his entry in mainstream politics as one of President Iskander Mirza's cabinet members. Bhutto, of course, was educated at the Universities of California (Berkeley) and Oxford as well.