The City Courts, Karachi’s largest judicial complex, appeared to be a battleground on Thursday as lawyers and judicial staff engaged in a violent clash leaving several injured.
The Karachi Bar Association (KBA) had announced a strike against an East district and sessions judge following an alleged scuffle between Muhammad Faisal, a watchman posted at one of the judicial complex’s entrance, and some members of the legal fraternity.
On Thursday morning, lawyers gathered at the City Courts’ entrances barring court employees and litigants from entering the premises. Subsequently, the judicial staff staged a protest on the main MA Jinnah Road, closing the road to vehicular traffic. The situation turned worse when the two sides came face to face and started pelting each other with stones, prompting the police to use teargas to disperse them.
Talking to The News, KBA President Ashfaq Gilal said at least 10 lawyers were injured in the clash. He said lawyers were peacefully protesting against the judge who, he alleged, had pitched the judicial staff against members of the legal fraternity.
Gilal said a delegation of lawyers later met the Sindh High Court (SHC) chief justice and presented their demands, which included the removal of the judge.
On June 1, the district and sessions judge had ordered the City Courts SHO to file an FIR against a group of lawyers for allegedly beating up the watchman. Faisal had submitted an application to the judge stating that some lawyers not only misbehaved and used abusive language but also beat him up.
They took him to the City Courts police station where they called their colleagues and 25 to 30 lawyers roughed him up in front of the SHO before he was locked up, he said, adding the he was kept behind the bars the entire night without any FIR registered against him and was released only after he submitted a written apology.
Observing that the watchman’s plea was ‘self-explanatory’, the judge had directed the SHO to lodge an FIR against the culprits and submit a compliance report.
The KBA, on the other hand, passed a resolution that rejected the watchman's allegations and condemned the judge’s attitude. It said Faisal was involved in ‘surveillance of advocates, issuing threats, motorcycle theft and mischief’.
The association said that an elected member of the bar lodged a complaint against the watchman who also ‘confessed’ to his guilt on May 31 but on the next day, he was released by the City Courts police station on the instructions of the judge.
