Islamabad:

Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) functioning Chief Justice Sardar Muhammad Sarfraz Dogar has noticed a letter written by the secretary of an IHC judge in terms of alleged demand for bribery from the court’s staff – transferred to IHC from other courts – from litigation.

Justice Dogar on Friday made up a committee consisting of IHC registrar Yar Muhammad Walana and additional registrar company Rai Muhammad Khan to start an investigation of the case and submit a report within three days.

In a letter written to the IHC registrar of Justice Babar Sattar’s secretary of the judge’s instruction, the alarm had been raised over the reported demand for “gratuity/ distributions” from litigation from the staff recently transferred from other high courts to IHC.

The letter had noticed that the court’s staff chasing the advice and litigation that have been exempted from demanding drinking staff and distributions has begun to raise his ugly head in IHC recently.

“The staff of IHC are full -time employees in the Court of Justice and are paid appropriate compensation for their services and duties as determined by the law. In order for an employee to seek gratuity from a lawyer or lawsuit for having some exemption of the court is an act of mismatch.

It said that all courts, including the high courts, have been established to discharge services to citizens, and as service providers it is for the courts and their staff to perform such services to the best of their ability.

“Accepting all distributions or gratuity paid by a lawyer and/or a legal party qualifies as a bribe on a part of a forensic worker, and to demand such gratuity qualify as seeking rent for exemption of justice and can have no place in the culture that exists to give citizens access to justice.