July 4, 2002	Thursday	Rabi-us-Sani 22,1423

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MUZAFFARABAD, July 3: The AJK High Court, setting aside the conviction of five former heads and 12 officials of the Mirpur Municipal Corporation by an Ehtesab Court, acquitted all of them here on Wednesday.

Ex-chairman Chaudhry Rafiq; former mayors: Chaudhry Khalid, Chaudhry Ashraf, Chaudhry Razzaq; former administrator Abdul Qayyum Qamar and 12 serving officials were sentenced by the Ehtesab Court No II, headed by Judge Raja Ashraf Kiani, to one-year simple imprisonment each in two different cases on Jan 5 this year.

They were charged for violating the estate rules of the corporation, which amounted to offence under the AJK Ehtesab Bureau Act 2001, and under some others laws of the land.

However, they challenged their conviction in the High Court which granted them bail. And on Wednesday, a two-member bench, comprising Justice Sardar Mohammad Nawaz and Justice Ghulam Mustafa Mughal, held that the prosecution could not establish the guilt of the accused beyond any shadow of doubt.

The bench also said in its 71-page decision that there were discrepancies in the statements of the prosecution witnesses, and the Ehtesab Court had not considered the matter in its true perspective in view of the law and the rules governing the subject.

The accused were represented by senior lawyers: Khawaja Shahad Ahmed, Abdur Rashid Abbasi and Mujahid Hussain Naqvi while the prosecution was represented by Ehtesab Bureau’s chief prosecutor Sardar Ashiq Hussain.