Islamabad:
The Supreme Court has called for transformative reforms that integrate technological innovation, administrative restructuring and disciplined case management to ensure the rapid disposal of cases.
In a four-page judgment written by justice, Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, while he heard a case that challenged the auction of a real estate, emphasized the point of law that the judiciary must draw on the global lessons and commit to the transformative reforms.
“Courts must develop into engines with timely, transparent and citizen -focused justice,” the ruling emphasized.
The auction in question took place in 2011 and the petitioner raised objections the same year, which was rejected. An appeal was filed for High Court, where it lasted for ten years, culminating with a decision in 2021.
The case then reached SC in 2022 and is now being processed, three years later, in 2025.
The judgment noted that legal systems around the world have acknowledged that delay is not an inevitable inevitable, but a soluble institutional challenge.
“Countries such as Singapore, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Estonia, Canada, China, Denmark and Australia have made extensive reforms that combine technology, structural innovation and procedural discipline to reduce backlog and increase the effectiveness of the court,” observed the court.
“Through tools such as e-archiving, real-time dashboards, automated planning and transparent digital supervision, these jurisdictions have been moved from being passive custodians of docks to active leaders of justice delivery. These international experiences are investigating a basic truth: Delays in justice are not inevitable;
Justice Shah observed that delay in the judgment carries severe macroeconomic and societal consequences. “It discourages investments, makes contractual illusory and weakens the institutional legitimacy of the judiciary.”
“The credibility of a legal system rests not only in the righteousness of its decisions, but also in the timeliness of which these decisions are made.”
It also noted that the issue was not only administrative but also constitutional, emphasizing that the right to access justice was guaranteed by Articles 4, 9 and 10a of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973.
“It includes within the right to a fair and timely trial. Delay that makes a remedy ineffective or a fairly illusory constitutes a denial of proper process. Justice, to be real, must be both fair and timely.”
The verdict further highlighted the extent of the problem. “It is relevant to emphasize that over 2.2 million cases are currently pending before the courts over Pakistan, including about 55,941 cases before this court alone, despite strengthening the number of judges in court. These figures are not abstract; they represent disputes suspended in time.”
The court noted that delay is not only the result of docket overload or inefficiency at the branch level; It is a deeper structural challenge for judicial governance.
“The court must, as a matter of institutional policy and constitutional responsibility, urgently surpass a modern, responsive and intelligent case management framework.”
“Such a system must at least ensure: the early fixation of cases on non-discriminatory basis; eliminating ‘queue-jumping’ and preferential planning; the prioritization of issues involving constitutional, financial or national importance without compromising on the timely solution of individual requirements to help with planning and triage.
In the present case, the Court noted that the petitioner’s appeal remained pending high court for ten years.
“It is outside of Cavil that the courts at any level of the justice system corrode public confidence in the judiciary, undermine the trial, and disproportionately harm the weak and vulnerable who cannot afford the cost of prolonged trial,” the verdict warned.
