PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council (KPBC) on Saturday announced that the bar associations were not allowed by the rules to give call for strikes without its approval, so it would issue show cause notices to the presidents and general secretaries of the associations, which did so.

It also said the elections forall district, tehsil and subtehsil bar associations in the province would be held on March 18 and those for high court bar associations on May 6.

The announcement came after a meeting of the KPBC executive committee here with its chairman, Syed Mubashir Shah, in the chair.

The other participants were the committee members, including Mohammad Ali Khan Jadoon, Syed Taimur Ali Shah and Akbar Khan Kohistani, and KPBC vice-chairman Zar Badshah Khan.

According to a statement issued by the KPBC, the executive committee consideredstrikes announced by different bar associations of the province without the approval of the bar council.

The committee observed that those strikes were announced in violation of the KP Bar Council Rules, 2010, and KP Bar Council Media and Strike Regulation, 2022, which didn`t authorise associations to announce strikes without the permission of the bar council.

It decided to issue show cause notices to the presidents and general secretaries of those bar associations for violating the rules why disciplinary action shouldn`t be initiated against them.

The meeting also discussedthe issue of annual elections for bar associations in the province.

According to the statement, under the Pakistan Bar Council Rules, 1976, and KPBC Rules, 2010, elections for district, tehsil and subtehsil bar associations are scheduled to be held on the last Saturday of March i.e.

March 25.

However, the meeting observed that the holy month of Ramazan was likely to begin on March 23, so it would be inconvenient to conduct that electoral exercise in that month.

It decided that electionsfor district, tehsil and sub-tehsil bar associations would be heldon March 18 and those for high court bar associations on May 6.

The committee asked the presidents of all bar associations to send three names each for nomination of the chairmen of the respective election boards by Feb 28 for formal appointment.

It also examined the applications by lawyers for extending the last date for paying dues to participate in bar elections and decided about the extension of that date to Feb 10 (Friday).

The committee said all lawyers were required to clear their annual dues by that date so that their names were included in voter lists.