Sardar Muhammad Iqbal, former Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court, died on 4 May 2008. He was elevated to the Bench in 1962 following one of the most successful and charismatic law practices that this country has known. I was his junior, as we were then called, from 1961-62. In fact, when on 5 August 1962, I was leaving for a Master's Programme at Yale Law School, he graciously came to the airport to see me off and confided that he had accepted to be a Judge of the Lahore High Court which would be announced in a few weeks. This gives me the distinction of being his junior most junior. That was the beginning of a long association of an ustad and shagird. It continued till the last few weeks of his life when he instructed me to act as his lawyer and to serve some legal notices for and on his behalf. He later summoned me to the Shaikh Zayed Hospital where he had been moved to instruct on the follow up to the legal notices. Between these almost five decades of my association, I want to capture some of my memories/snapshots with Sardar Sahib, as most of us, respectfully, called him. The first thing that overwhelmed me about Sardar Sahib was the respect, affection and attention that he received from one and all. During the last one year of his law practice in Lahore before his elevation to the High Court when I worked with him, his chamber was the storm centre of all that was happening in the country. Any big matter in the news whether civil, criminal or political you could be sure that it would end up for Sardar Sahib's handling. For a young lawyer, it was fascinating to be regularly receiving clients in the office who were news celebrities. Whether it was a prominent bureaucrat who had lost his foreign wife to a General or a General's wife who was complaining of domestic violence, or a well known feudal family involved in a murder charge, they all reached out to Sardar Sahib for help. The other remarkable aspect of Sardar Sahib was that he was the last genuine generalist lawyer. Specializations such as in insurance, corporate and regulatory work were on the horizon but Sardar Sahib handled criminal, civil, revenue, litigation, taxation, and transport cases with consummate skills and flourish. A typical day for him would start with almost the break of dawn for his teaching at the Punjab University Law College/Civil Services Academy. He would move to several transport route or revenue cases at the Board of Revenue. Next, he would be doing an important murder case at the district courts. He would, finally, arrive in the High court to attend to a list of atleast 10 cases per day. All this by 3 p.m., then to his office at 4 Mozang Road, to recap the day and plan the next. A few hours visit to his house at White House Lane and a smiling Sardar Sahib would reappear in the office by 6 p.m. The preparation of the cases for the next day would keep him and all of us in the office well past midnight each week day and the week-ends were equally vulnerable to his dedication to work. Sardar Sahib was obsessive about thoroughness and no detail in the brief ever escaped him. He was meticulous in his legal research after he had fully mastered the facts. And, we juniors who helped the preparation of his cases proudly witnessed the excellence of his advocacy, his razor sharp intellect, and his fierce memory, all combining to the magic that was Sardar Iqbal. You invariably felt sorry for his adversaries. I give all these details to emphasize both his hard work and his work-ethic: the client deserves and should get the best. The rigours, stresses and pressures on him would have affected the personality of most individuals but another hallmark of Sardar Sahib was his charm, ever-constant smile and pleasantness. This is a gift of nature and this endeared him to everybody who came in contact with him. For the entire period that I worked with him, I never saw Sardar Sahib lose his temper with any junior, staff or in his inter-actions in the court or with anybody. Sardar Sahib had the unique gift of making everybody he met feel special. He encouraged all who came in contact with him. As a Judge, he was known for his warmth particularly to the younger lawyers. All of us have a story about how the first time we appeared before him reinforced our self-confidence. He would overlook the legion faults or shortcomings of a young lawyer but always notice and bring up his good qualities, even if that seemed an impossible discovery. When with other lawyers, Sardar Sahib never allowed a junior or younger lawyer to pay; the lunch, tea, dinner or cold drink was always the "privilege", as he put it, of the Senior. His generosity with juniors was not commonplace; contrarily, it was unique at that time. Elegance seemed his natural forte. He dressed well, rode good cars, lived well, spoke well, worked well and earned well. Elegance permeated both his office and home. Iffat Apa, Sardar Sahib's charming wife, provided the ideal family setting for a man destined for success. She shared his passion for hospitality, good living and style. His offices, where we worked, were equally impressive. This was an era when the telephones, air conditioning, hospitality tea and cold drinks in the office were only for the use and enjoyment of the Senior and the visiting client. But Sardar Sahib lived and worked with a pioneering egalitarianism that was ahead of his times in that it allowed juniors equal access to these facilities. Indebted as I have felt to Sardar Sahib for having guided me to join the legal profession and to have nurtured my interest in it, I always looked for opportunities to reciprocate his affection. But it was a measure of his total self-reliance that he would rather always give than take. He, however, turned to me, during a lifetime of association, for only two (2) personal recommendations. One, during the elections in 1993, he came to my house early in the morning to recommend a candidate for a ticket for the National Assembly. I was then on the Parliamentary Board of the Tehrik-i-Istiqlal and it turned out that we had fewer candidates than the seats. Sardar Sahib's recommendee automatically got the seat and, also, the gratitude of the Party. The second occasion was when, as Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court, he suggested that his son, Shahid Iqbal, work with me as I had done with him almost fifteen (15) years earlier. I was on the popular TV Program 50 Minutes on Sardar Sahib's last evening in this world. His family that has, over the years, lovingly included me as its own informs me that he postponed his dinner to finish watching the Program as he had found that I was in it. For an ustad to show this deference and be complimentary about a grateful shagird in his final hours will remain an important memory of my life. Sardar Sahib was a gift to Lahore, the legal profession, and this country. I am fortunate that I was a part of his generation to have witnessed firsthand the glow and warmth of his personality and humanity. For the past few years, I had been talking to several of Sardar Sahib's legion juniors that we should plan an evening in his honour. I knew that the light was fading and each of us had so much to acknowledge in his debt. This did not happen. I would always regret this. But I feel somewhat compensated that I had turned to him as my mentor in 2003 to dedicate the Dr. Parvez Hassan Environmental Law Centre to the Punjab University for and on my behalf. Thank you, Sardar Sahib, for enriching my life with your attention, wisdom, affection, and love.