In a significant milestone for women’s representation in Pakistan’s judiciary, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is all set to have its first woman chief justice.
Justice Mussarat Hilali will resume the charge of the Peshawar High Court Chief Justice as two senior judges of the high court are set to retire in March.
The judges who are set to retire include PHC Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid, who is also a member of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), and Roohul Amin Khan.
Justice Mussarat Hilali is likely to resume the charge of the high court chief justice in April till August 7 when she is expected to retire, Express Tribune reported.
According to her profile information given on the website of the Peshawar High Court, Justice Mussarat Hilali received her law degree from Khyber Law College Peshawar University and enrolled as an advocate of district courts in 1983; as an advocate of the high court in 1988 and enrolled as an advocate of Supreme Court of Pakistan in 2006.
She was also the first woman additional advocate general of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa when she resumed the charge in November 2001 which lasted until March 2004. She was also the first woman appointed as Chairperson Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Environmental Protection Tribunal.
In 2018, Justice Tahira Safdar became the first woman in Pakistan to take charge as a high court chief justice when she was nominated by then-chief justice of Pakistan Saqib Nisar as chief justice of the Balochistan High Court.
