FCC fails to reduce top courts’ combined pendency
The creation of the Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) has failed to produce a significant reduction in the combined case pendency of Pakistan’s two top courts during its first 10 months of functioning.
Before the passage of the 27th Amendment under which the new court was established, the federal government maintained that creating the FCC would ease the burden on the Supreme Court and expedite relief for ordinary litigants.
The government also argued that cases delayed because of what it described as judicial activism by the SC would be dealt with more efficiently through the separate constitutional forum.
However, legal circles say the reform has so far amounted largely to a redistribution of cases between the two courts rather than a meaningful reduction in the backlog.
Before the FCC began functioning on November 13, 2025, a total of 56,608 cases were pending before the SC. Of these, 22,183 cases were transferred to the newly created FCC, while 33,925 remained with the SC.
At present, 32,718 cases are pending before the SC and 23,340 before the FCC, bringing the combined pendency of the two courts to 56,058 cases. The figures show that despite the transfer of more than 22,000 cases to the FCC, the overall backlog of the two top courts has remained almost unchanged.
The development has also raised questions about the allocation of judicial resources following the 27th Amendment. The SC currently has 17 working judges, while seven judges are serving in the FCC. Six judicial positions in the FCC remain vacant.
The government allocated Rs7.441 billion for the SC and Rs6.048 billion for the FCC in the 2026-27 budget. Lawyers say that despite the substantial increase in public spending on the two courts, including higher salaries for judges and staff, there has been no corresponding improvement in pendency.
They have also questioned why the vacant judicial positions in the FCC have not been filled.
Renowned lawyer Faisal Siddiqi said the FCC was not created primarily to reduce case pendency but to ensure what he termed “regime pendency.”
Advocate Umer Gilani said that with nearly 24 judges now working at the apex level, compared with 17 previously, and spending on the two courts having roughly doubled, the pendency remained virtually unchanged.
“This proves that the creation of the FCC was in fact a purely political project, and not a recipe for defeating delay. These statistics are a cause of concern for everyone who genuinely cares about expeditious delivery of justice,” Gilani said.
Lawyers, however, noted that the pendency of criminal petitions and appeals had declined over the past couple of years. They attributed the reduction primarily to measures taken after the 26th Constitutional Amendment, when two SC benches were specifically tasked with clearing the backlog of criminal cases.
Hafiz Ahsaan Ahmed Khokhar, who closely examines the functioning of both top courts, said the beginning of the new judicial year next week provides an appropriate opportunity to assess whether the promise of the 27th Amendment is translating into meaningful relief for ordinary litigants.
He said the purpose of creating a separate constitutional forum was not merely to divide files and jurisdiction but to accelerate the delivery of justice.
“This therefore needs to be revisited by both apex courts: how can the constitutional restructuring be translated into a genuinely effective case-management system in the future?” he said.
Khokhar said lawyers and litigants had very high expectations from the constitutional reform and those expectations ultimately need to be answered through measurable improvements in the time taken to decide cases.
He suggested that the SC and the FCC consider comprehensive backlog-reduction plans, identify and prioritise very old cases, strictly control unnecessary adjournments and introduce digital case-flow monitoring.
He also proposed specialised benches for constitutional, civil, criminal, tax, commercial and other categories of cases. Special backlog benches and, where feasible, afternoon benches could increase effective court hours and assist in clearing old cases, he said.
A realistic, time-bound mechanism could also be developed under which cases are not only fixed promptly but are taken through successive stages without unnecessary gaps until final judgment, he added.
“With due respect, the experience of the first year suggests that the present model requires further refinement, and the new judicial year provides both apex courts an opportunity to examine what has worked, what has not worked, and what additional measures—including increased judicial strength of the FCC—are necessary to achieve the original constitutional objective,” Khokhar said.Read More