PESHAWAR, Oct 20: The Peshawar High Court on Monday granted bail to a person arrested in connection with a police encounter during which six persons including three policemen were killed.

A single bench comprising Justice Nasirul Mulk ordered that the accused-applicant, Abdul Qudoos, should be released after furnishing two sureties of Rs200,000 each.

Arif Khan advocate appeared for the applicant and argued that the high court had directed last year that the case of the applicant should be decided in an expeditious manner. However, despite the passage of over an year the case had yet to be decided, he added.

A heavy police force had raided a house in Kohat on Sept 6, 1997, maintaining that some anti-social elements had been hiding there. On this occasion a shootout took place between the police party and the inmates of the house. A police inspector, Abdul Ismail, and two other cops, Mushtaq Ahmad and Amjad Ali were killed. Three of the accused belonging to the Punjab — Hafiz Mubashir, Mohammad Amir Butt and Mohammad Ijaz — were also killed in the shootout.

Later, the police launched a search for the owner of the house, Abdul Qudoos, who was arrested in 2001. The relatives of the accused claimed that the accused had political differences with the then prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, due to which his government had announced a head-money on them.

The bail applications of the accused-applicant were earlier dismissed by the trial court, high court and the Supreme Court.

While disposing of the bail plea the Supreme Court had directed that his case should be decided within six months. When his case could not be decided due to non-appearance of prosecution witnesses who mostly belonged to the police department, the Kohat district and sessions judge granted him bail last year.

On the application of the state, the high court cancelled his bail and he was again arrested. The high court directed that the case should be decided in a speedy manner.