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KARACHI, April 21: The Sindh High Court dismissed on Monday a quashment petition moved by one of the police officers involved in Murtaza Bhutto murder case and put off the hearing of identical pleas by two others.
Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali agreed with the contention raised by Assistant Advocate-General Sadruddin Qureshi that SHO Zeeshan Kazmi had been declared a proclaimed offender and been absconding since the rejection of his bail plea. He had failed to pursue his remedy personally or through his counsel and the quashment petition was not maintainable in his absence. The petition was accordingly dismissed for non-prosecution.
The judge asked the counsel for two other police officers, Shoaib Suddle and Wajid Durrani, to produce all the documents they relied on for acquittal of their clients within four weeks, after which their petitions would be taken up for detailed hearing by the court.
Murtaza Bhutto, son of the late prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was killed in a police operation in Clifton in September 1996. The case is being tried by a sessions court, that has recorded evidence of 17 prosecution witnesses.
RAPE CASE: A Pakistani accused of committing rape in the United States but exonerated by an inquiry magistrate after preliminary inquiry under the Extradition Act approached the Sindh High Court on Monday for his release.
Haris Hasan submitted, through Advocate Syed Saeeduddin Nasir, that he had been discharged by judicial magistrate Mrs Sadaf Asif after a detailed inquiry for lack of evidence of a primafacie case against him. An SHC division bench, that was seized of his father Nadir Hasan’s petition for his release in view of the prolonged extradition inquiry, ordered his release on April 16 if he was not required in any other case. The jail authorities, however, refused to set him at liberty.
Nadir Hasan moved a contempt petition against the jail authorities. Haris Hasan was produced in the court, but a provincial government law officer submitted that he had been detained afresh for three months under the Foreigners Act. Advocate Saeeduddin Nasir contended in the petition filed by him on Monday that the maximum detention period stipulated by the Foreigners Act was two months and nobody could be detained for three months under it.
Haris Hasan was accused of raping a girl and assaulting her boyfriend in Michigan before his return to Pakistan in January. Extradition proceedings were initiated against him and the preliminary inquiry was assigned to judicial magistrate Sadaf Asif, who exonerated him.
BAIL GRANTED: Justice Sabihuddin Ahmed of the Sindh High Court granted a travel agency chief executive interim bail before arrest on Monday.
Mrs Anjum A. Rab of Travel Express has been charged under the provisions of the Immigration Ordinance with providing airline tickets to 82 people on fake Saudi employment visas and protectors’ clearance. She moved the high court for bail before arrest through Advocate Mohammed Jamil.
Issuing notice to a federal government law officer for April 28, Justice Ahmed observed that the applicant “being a lady and not accused of an offence punishable by death or 10 years’ imprisonment, may not be arrested till the next date (April 28) subject to her furnishing solvent security and personal bond in the sum of Rs200,000.”
A division bench, comprising Justice Ataur Rahman and Justice M. Ashraf Leghari, enlarged murder accused Mohammad Amin on bail in the sum of Rs100,000. Along with Ali Qaiser Naqvi and Mohammad Saeed, Amin was accused of killing police sub-inspector Shaukat Ali and injuring Bashir at Orangi in October 1998. The first information report was lodged by Shaukat’s brother Haider Ali against unknown persons. Later, the police named the accused on the basis of an alleged confessional statement by Saeed.
The complainant and other eyewitnesses, however, exonerated all three accused at the trial and one of them, Amin, approached the high court for bail.
In another case, Justice Ghulam Rabbani admitted three kidnap-cum-rape accused to bail in the sum of Rs100,000 each. Yusuf, Farid and Imran were accused of abducting 25-year-old Fatima and her younger sister Sakina. In their statements to the police, however, they denied having been raped by the accused. There were no medicolegal reports to substantiate the charge either.
Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali dismissed a bail application moved by a dacoity accused. Nadeem Ali alias Dadi is facing trial for robbing a family of Rs600,000 and jewellery at gunpoint after confining family members to a room in their house. Nadeem claimed that he had not been identified by prosecution witnesses and stolen articles were planted on him by the police.
STAY ORDER: A division bench issued notice to the respondents on an appeal by a resident of Bizerta Lines and restrained them from demolishing her structure.
Appellant Nishat Begum’s counsel, Advocate Munawar Sultana, submitted before the bench, which consisted of Justice Sarmad Jalal Osmany and Justice Rehmat Hussain Jaffery, that she was not granted lease of her plot, though the area had been declared a kutchi abadi long ago. All other residents had been issued lease documents. Her petition in this behalf was dismissed by a single judge. Notices were issued for April 24 and status quo ordered till that date.
Justice M. Sadiq Leghari admitted to regular hearing accused Abu Bakar’s petition against his involvement in a sex scandal. He said he was a homeopath practising medicine but was implicated in a false case by his rivals, who also had his clinic at New Kumharwara.
