Introduction
I have an outdated habit, soon it will be called primitive, keeping hard copies of photographs, and the size has gone on decreasing, now five inches by seven inches. The larger, bulkier albums are still there. If I pull them out they are likely to fall from my hand, if not, I am more likely to fall under their weight. The same is happening with bulky books and folders. These smaller photos somehow give me the feeling that the entire events antecedent and attendant, except the exact names, appear like a flash giving me the impression that they are holding the fort against dementia. How long nobody knows.
There is a photo in my small album showing me receiving a certificate from a Chief Justice for and as a member of foreign legal consultant group successfully completing and contributing to a program on Access to Justice in Pakistan. Seeing that picture what came to my mind I have divided into phases that follow:
Phase 1
Tamizuddin Khan of the majority province of Pakistan, more than thousand miles away from his home, performing the duties of Speaker of Constituent Assembly, a high powered body was dismissed/removed from that position by the order of the Governor-General of Pakistan. Then followed a course of action unparalleled worldwide. All routes to the Court were blocked by men in uniform, men without uniform, men visible and men invisible. Another unique thing happened. Tamizuddin Khan got a burqa (a bodywear from head to foot no part of the body visible). An ostensible mehrum (a male permissible companion) was arranged and they moved forward to the court unnoticed, undetected. In that position Tamizuddin Khan jumped over the enclosure wall of the court and was able to hand over his petition challenging the Governor General’s action.
The superpowers finding that they had been so pitiably outwitted got arrested his local attorney from the Court. Justice Constantine, Chief Judge, called his Registrar and directed him to convey to the Inspector General Police to release the attorney forthwith or come and face Contempt of Court proceedings. The attorney was forthwith released.
Phase 2
D.N Pritt, a lawyer from England has in his memoirs in three volumes described the world of his experiences in defending political and other cases. In Volume 3 Chapter 5 he describes” the political cases in Pakistan Algiers and Nagpur” from pages 47 to 49 are described the two Pakistan cases. The first case from Pakistan was an Army trial of Major General Akbar Khan, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Sayed Sajjad Zaheer and others. Its peculiarities and procedures all described in fair detail.
The second case was of Tamizuddin Khan. The superpowers of the country assumed that no lawyer from inside the country will take Tamizuddin Khan case, barricaded all the international airports in the country to dispatch back immediately any lawyer coming from abroad to rescue him. Mr Pritt himself describes how the matter was handled.
Then, in 1954 I had another case in Pakistan. The Government had assumed the power to dissolve the Constituent Assembly; speaker and some other members challenged this in the courts and employed me to appear for them. I was in Singapore at the time; and thinking it unsafe to communicate with me by letter or cable they sent one of their number to Singapore to talk to me. I agreed to do the case if it should prove possible, and we arranged, as a modest disguise for further cables, that I was a surgeon who might be required for a difficult operation in Karachi. Further talks took place in Colombo and I accepted the case and arrived in Karachi by air with my wife. My clients fearing that I might be excluded from Pakistan by the Government if it realized why I was coming did not meet us at the airport we accordingly took the omnibus into Karachi, and got into touch with them there. We set about arduous work of preparing the arguments. I had an admirable junior, Syed Sharifuddin…
A little to my surprise after long arguments and some impression of division of opinion among the judges the , we obtained a unanimous judgment in our favor both on the question of procedure and on the merit
The government appealed to the Federal Court–the final court of appeal—and there concentrated on the barren point of procedure. I have mentioned I was not engaged on the appeal, as my clients and his friends had little money to pay my fees and did not like to ask me to act for nothing, which I would have done. The government won on the point of procedure and had thus spent nearly a year in avoiding a decision on a vital, and urgent constitutional matter. It then had to get the point really decided by making a “special reference” to the Federal court
The Court Calls For Me.
That court when giving directions as to when and how the reference should be argued, pressed my client, the Speaker of the Assembly in open court to secure somehow that I should attend. He accordingly asked me to do so, saying that he hoped to be able to collect enough money to pay my fees. I felt it my duty to accept and went out to argue the reference. We had a very interesting legal struggle, but in the end we lost: the court did not feel equal to telling the Government that it had not only acted illegally but in effect been governing the country for a year or more in defiance of the constitution.
When it came to the question of costs of the reference most of the various parties were the organs of the central or state governments whose costs were provided out of public funds; my client, however, was not in that position, and I asked the court to order the government to pay a substantial sum toward his costs since he had incurred expenses at Court’s suggestion. To this, the court responded by making an order that the Government should pay Rs 10,000, then just over l000(sterling pounds)- to me personally. It seemed an odd sort of an order but Rs. 10,000 were duly paid.
Phase 3
M.A.K Chaudhry’s book Of All Those Years page 145
Justice Munir who was law minister during the Ayub Regime was reported to have said to Ayub that Bengalis in the National Assembly were very volatile, and perhaps they wanted to separate. Ayub asked him to find out. Munir invited several prominent Bengal leaders to tea at his house and dropped a hint to this effect. The Bengali leaders took umbrage at this and said “Look here, Munir, we are Pakistani. If you wish to separate, go ahead”. With that, they all left.
Experiences of a Lifetime 