An altercation between an additional judge of the Lahore High Court (LHC), Justice Erum Sajjad Gul, and the Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA) president, Pir Masood Chishti, has led to lawyers boycotting the courts yet again. The counsel had arrived late for the hearing of his case and the presiding judge had it re-listed. When Chishti arrived, he insisted that the judge either hear the case or fix another date for it. When the judge said that she could not take up the matter again and wished to move on to the next case, Chishti refused to leave the rostrum. It is clear that Chishti was unnecessarily wasting the court’s time and then stubbornly refusing to leave the rostrum. This attitude is certainly not befitting of the president of a Bar association. Rather than collectively condemning the actions of their president, the LHCBA decided to boycott the courtroom of Justice Gul and staged a protest outside the Bar office. This blatant disrespect is punishable by contempt of court, yet the group mentality that leads lawyers to believe that they can get away with intimidating and coercing judges forced Justice Gul to leave the courtroom. Out of the 60 LHC judges, only three are women. In largely male-dominated institutions, it is difficult for a woman to make her place and establish her authority. Perhaps Chishti would have been more willing to follow the Judge’s orders if she were a man. The notion that lawyers in Pakistan can strongarm the justice system into acceding to their whims is detrimental to the judicial process. Any intervention from state bodies or the judiciary to check this trend may cause more problems. Bar associations themselves must police their members, promote reasonable behaviour and adherence to courtroom etiquette, rather than being influenced by this sort of group mentality. Many of the failures of Pakistan’s justice system stem from its inability to resolve cases in a timely fashion, which is why Justice Gul’s ire at the counsel’s late arrival and her eagerness to move on to the next case is completely warranted. Lawyers, particularly those that represent and lead Bar associations need to be aware of the importance of appearing in court at the scheduled hearing. Even minor delays can cause significant backlogs. Rather than understanding the consequences of being repeatedly late to the hearings of the case, Chishti reacted unreasonably, demanded that his case be heard again and tried to convince his colleagues to boycott court proceedings. All this commotion will lead to unnecessary delays in the pending cases before the LHC. If the LHCBA goes on strike, the backlog will get even worse. *