NA passes bill against unnecessary adjournments

Fri, February 03, 2017

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly has passed an important legislation aimed at discouraging false and frivolous litigation and unnecessary adjournments in order to ensure speedy justice and avoid dragging of cases in courts.

A brief debate on the issue of mysterious disappearances of bloggers and activists from different parts of the country was the only other significant business undertaken during the dull and poorly attended proceedings of the lower house of parliament on Thursday.

The Costs of Litigation Bill 2016 empowers judges to impose cost of litigations on those seeking adjournment of hearings in both civil and criminal cases on “baseless grounds”. The bill envisages the minimum cost of Rs5,000 per adjournment in civil cases and Rs10,000 in criminal cases.

The bill was passed by the assembly with an amendment suggested by the law and justice committee that “if the court is satisfied that the adjournment being sought is on account of unavoidable reasons beyond the control of the party concerned, which reasons shall be recorded by the court, the court may grant adjournment without imposing adjournment costs.”

Another clause of the bill says: “If in any proceedings, the court finds that any averment made by any party is false or vexatious to the knowledge of such party, the court shall award special costs to the opposite party against whom such averment has been made.”

The bill, however, provides indemnity to the government as it says that “the government shall not be liable to the costs”.

Piloting the bill, Law Minister Zahid Hamid said the government had introduced this “very important” legislation on an “experimental basis” with the hope that it would bring positive results in ensuring speedy justice. He was of the opinion that after the enforcement of the law, everyone would think twice before seeking adjournment of hearings in courts.

The minister said that for the time being the law would only apply to Islamabad Capital Territory, but hoped the provincial assemblies would also bring such legislations.

Shafqat Mehmood and Dr Arif Alvi of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) termed the bill “a positive step”, but suggested some amendments.

Dr Alvi was of the view that the bill should have a mention of the number of adjournments which could be sought in a case, whereas Mr Mehmood objected to a provision in the law which gives indemnity to the public servants.

However, the law minister asked the legislators not to press for amendments, saying the government would keep the law under review.

Published in Dawn, February 3rd, 2017

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