KARACHI: ATC puts off hearing for want of space in jail
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, March 6: An anti-terrorism court on Thursday put off the hearing of a bomb blast case because of non- availability of a courtroom inside the Central Prison.
Judge Feroz Mehmood Bhatti of the ATC-2, conducting the trial inside the jail, fixed Friday for the hearing of the case against an activist of the banned Harkatul Mujahideen Al-Aalmi.
The only courtroom inside the jail was already occupied by Judge Aley Maqbool Rizvi of the ATC-1, who proceeded with two separate cases against two sectarian group activists.
The provincial authorities had in August last notified the jail trial of over 30 cases against the accused belonging to various sectarian and Jihadi organizations.
While the four ATCs have been assigned the trial of these cases, there are only two courtrooms on the premises of the Central Prison. One of the rooms was set up inside the Juvenile Jail.
The courtroom inside the Central Prison is shared by the ATCs 1 and 2, and the room inside the Juvenile Jail by the ATCs 4 and 5 on alternate days.
The case, fixed for hearing by Judge Feroz Bhatti of the ATC-2, pertained to a rocket blast.
The Aalmi worker, Sabir Waseem, has been charged with launching an anti-tank rocket (BM-107) that had pierced the wall of the Commerce College on the Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Road on November 23, 2001.
According to the bomb disposal squad, the device was an anti-tank rocket, weighing 25 kilograms with 10 to 12 kilograms of explosive material.
SALIM QADRI CASE: The ATC-1, headed by Judge Aley Maqbool Rizvi, fixed March 15 for hearing of the Salim Qadri murder case against a worker of the banned Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan, Mohammed Faisal.
The ST chief and five others were killed on May 18, 2001 in Baldia Town in an ambush when they were being driven to a mosque for Juma prayers.
The dead included Anis Qadri, 23, nephew of the ST chief, and Altaf Husain, brother-in-law of Maulana Salim Qadri, Ibrahim Qadri and Abid Baloch, driver of the victims’ car.
PRISONERS’ VAN CASE: The same court (ATC-1) also fixed March 15 for hearing of another case pertaining to an attack on a prisoners’ van.
Two people, including a constable, Shakil, were killed when the prisoners’ van, also carrying some sectarian workers, was ambushed on Feb 28 last year near Bohra Pir in the limits of Nabi Bux police.
