Zubair Qureshi
Chief Justice of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) Justice Athar Mionallah has termed the role of the court reporters important in restoring public confidence in the courts of the country and hoped they will continue to perform their duties in a professional and unbiased way.
The IHC Chief Justice gave these views at a reception in honour of the newly-elected office-bearers of the Islamabad High Court Journalists Association (IHCJA) on the lawns of the IHC here on Friday.
Current President of the IHCJA Saqib Bashir, Secretary Ehtisham Kiani and members of the association along with former President Amir Saeed Abbasi and Awais Yousafzai were also present on the occasion.
The Chief Justice was of the view that the court reporters presented the true picture to both the courts of the country and the litigants and through them people came to know whether institutions were working according to merit and as per law or not.
In that particular context, the role of the media has assumed all the more importance and is like a catalyst through which one knows in which directions things are moving. The chief justice said for peace and progress of a society rule of law was of utmost importance and where there was no rule of law, there was chaos and anarchy.
He expressed his pleasure that the journalists’ representative body of the Islamabad High Court conducted elections every year in a fair and transparent way and congratulated its newly elected cabinet. He also expressed the hope in future too the beat reporters of the IHC would continue to establish higher journalistic values by reporting on court issues/cases.
On the occasion newly-elected President of the IHCJA Saqib Bashir, Secretary Ehtisham Kiani and other members of the cabinet thanked the Chief Justice for the kind gesture. They also apprised the chief justice of the problems the association of High Court reporters was facing. The Chief Justice promised to look into them and do the needful.
Last Saturday (January 16), the IHCJA through an electoral process got new cabinet including Saqib Bashir (Reporter, Express News) as President, Ehtisham Kiani of ‘24 News’ as Secretary, Shehzad Malik (BBC) as Senior Vice President, Ambreen Ali (Capital TV) as Vice President, Zeshan Syed (Neo News) as Finance Secretary, Tahir Naseer (Dawn News) as Senior Joint Secretary, Farah Mah Jabeen (Hum News) as Joint Secretary and Hussain Chaudhry (92 News) as Press Secretary.
Members of the Governing Body elected unopposed include Zubair Qureshi (Pakistan Observer), Asif Naveed (Aaj News), Raja Basharat (Daily Jinnah), Najeeb Malik (Jahan-e-Pakistan), Muhammad Faiz (Daily Ummat) and Burhan Bukhari (Abb Takk News).
