ISLAMABAD: Addressing the mystery surrounding the departure of judge to the UK hours after convicting PTI Chairman Imran Khan in the Toshakhana case on Saturday, the Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) record shows Humayun Dilawar was shortlisted for a training course in London over two months ago, in May.

       Additional District and Sessions Judge (ADSJ) Dilawar was one of the initial nominees for the training, but his name was dropped when his visa was not approved. However, he was able to attend the course on the basis of a private visa and after another nominee failed to get his visa on time.

       The University of Hull nominated eight officers of the Islamabad Judicial Service (IJS), including an officer of the Supreme Court, for judicial training on human rights and rule of law on May 25.

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       The training sessions were scheduled to be held from Aug 5 to 13. Initially, ADSJs Abida Sajjad and Huma-yun Dilawar; civil judges Ayesha Shabbir, Saqib Jawad, Sanam Bukh-ari, Samia Iqbal, and Rizwanuddin Qureshi; and Hasan Riaz, an SC officer, were shortlisted for the course. The nominations were approved by the IHC’s administration. However, due to some processing error both the ADSJs and civil judges Jawad, Qureshi and Shabbir couldn’t obtain visas.

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       On June 21, the varsity nominated four other judges from IJS and one officer from KP Judicial Service. They were District and Sessions Jud-ge Kamran Basharat Mufti, ADSJs Zeba Chaudhary and Sayyed Faizan Hai-der, Civil Judge Suhaib Bilal, and Farah Attaullah, DSJ from KP.

       The IHC approved these nomina-tions. Meanwhile, ADSJ Dilawar applied for visa and ex-Pakistan leave for a private visit to the UK, and this time he was granted the visa.

       When he informed the university about it, they kept him on the waiting list.

       It was pure chance that ADSJ Haider’s visa got delayed and due to shortage of time the university again nominated ADSJ Dilawar since he had a valid visa.

       Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2023