KARACHI, March 22: The district and sessions judge, South, granted bail on Saturday to Bilal Khar, son of former Punjab governor Ghulam Mustafa Khar, in an acid attack case.
Bilal Khar, a former member of the Punjab assembly, was arrested on Nov 1 last year in Muzaffargarh for allegedly throwing acid on his wife, Fakhira. He had been booked by the Napier police in May 2000 on the complaint of Shahida Malik, the mother-in-law of his wife’s sister, Kiran, whose husband, Irfan Malik, was also injured in the attack.
Judge Agha Rafique Ahmed Khan granted bail to Bilal in the sum of Rs200,000 and ordered his release if his custody was not required in any other case.
The prosecution suffered a major blow when the complainant and her injured son, appearing as prosecution witnesses, were declared hostile before the bail application of the defendant, being represented by Shahadat Awan, came up for hearing.
Both the woman and her son deposed that the defendant was not the man who had attacked. The attacker was short and had pox scars on his face, they said.
During cross-examination, they said Fakhira had been in Italy for more than two years for treatment.
Arguing for the release of Mr Khar on bail, the defence counsel submitted that all four witnesses, examined so far by the prosecution, had turned hostile and none of them had involved his client in the case.
He submitted that his client might be given bail as there was no likelihood of Fakhira’s return in the near future.
Earlier on Thursday the first two prosecution witness — Kiran, sister of Fakhira, and her brother-in-law, Amir Malik, were declared hostile at the request of the district attorney, Abdur Rahman Baloch, after they categorically deposed that Mr Khar was not the attacker.
According to the FIR, the complainant reported to the police that the estranged wife of Bilal Khar was staying at her apartment. On May 14, 2000, Bilal came there around 2:30pm and escaped after throwing acid on his wife in the presence of her daughter-in-law, Kiran, wife of Irfan Malik, and her son Amir Malik, who was injured in the attack.
CARBOMB CASE: The anti-terrorism court No 1, headed by Judge Aley Maqbool Rizvi, adjourned the hearing of the US consulate carbomb case against the leaders and workers of the banned Harkatul Mujahideen Al-Aalmi after dismissing an application of a defence counsel for recalling a prosecution witness.
The judge, who is holding trial inside the Central Prison, Karachi, dismissed the application of Khawaja Naveed as he did not turn up till 12:30pm.
The self-styled chief of his own Aalmi faction of the banned organization, Mohammed Imran, his deputy, Mohammed Ashraf, and finance secretary, Mohammed Hanif, and workers Sharib and Zubair have been charged with the carbombing that killed 12 people, including five women, and injured 43 others.
The judge fixed March 26 for recording the statements of the defendants.
Khawaja Naveed Ahmed, counsel for Mohammed Ashraf, had applied to the court for recalling Judicial Magistrate Rahmat Ullah Moro.
CHARGES FRAMED: Judge Arshad Noor Khan of the ATC-3 indicted two men in a kidnapping for ransom case.
Mohammed Ameen and Abdur Rahman were charged with kidnapping Mohammed Iqbal Khokhar, a travel agent, and his former employee Tahira on Nov 21 last year. Both the accused denied their involvement and pleaded not guilty.
According to the prosecution, the accused kidnapped the victims in Mr Khokhar’s car near Johar Mor in the police limits of Gulshan-i-Iqbal.
They allegedly took the victims to a flat on the sixth floor of a residential complex in Gulistan-i-Jauhar where they snatched at gunpoint 1,700 US dollars and Rs3,000 from the travel agent and demanded another Rs500,000.
It was also alleged that the accused stripped the hostage woman naked and made her video.
Later, the kidnappers allegedly took the two hostages to the ATM machine at the Citibank on Sharea Faisal and drew Rs20,000 through Mr Khokhar’s ATM card as partial payment of the ransom money.
The accused, arrested on Dec 8 last year, then took the victims to Nazimabad and got off Mr Khokhar’s car near Sir Syed College.
They were booked under sections 365-A, 384, 388 and 34 of PPC.
