ISLAMABAD – The Supreme Judicial Commission (SJC) accepted the promotion of Peshawar High Court (PHC) Chief Justice Musarrat Hilali to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, making her the second woman to be admitted to the higher court.
The SJC, led by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, made the judgement unanimously.
Earlier, CJP Bandial convened a meeting of the judicial committee to consider the nomination of two Supreme Court justices.
Justice Hilali took oath as temporary chief justice of the PHC on April 1, becoming the first woman in KP to hold the role.
At a ceremony conducted at the PHC, Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa Governor Ghulam Ali delivered the oath to Ms Hilali. Several judges, Pakistan’s Attorney General Usman Mansoor Awan, and a huge number of attorneys attended the event.
She was the second woman judge in Pakistan to be appointed to the position of chief justice of a high court, after Justice Tahira Safdar of the Balochistan High Court (BHC). Justice Hilali would serve as Chief Justice until her retirement.
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She was born on August 8, 1961, in Peshawar, and obtained her law degree from Khyber Law College, Peshawar University. She became an Advocate of District Courts in 1983 and an Advocate of the High Court in 1988. In 2006, she was appointed as an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.
She was the first woman elected office-bearer on the post of secretary at the bar from 1988 to 1989, vice president at the bar (twice) from 1992 to 1994, General Secretary 1997-1998, and first woman twice elected as an executive member of Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) from 2007-2008 and 2008-2009.
From November 2001 until March 2004, she was the first woman Additional Advocate General for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and she was then appointed as the first woman head of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Environment Protection Tribunal.
She was also the first woman Ombudsman for the Protection of Women at Workplace Harassment. On March 26, 2013, she was raised to the Bench as an Additional Judge, and on March 13, 2014, she was confirmed as a permanent judge of the Peshawar High Court.
