08 October 2004	Friday	22 Shaban 1425

KARACHI, Oct 7: An Anti-Terrorism Appellate (ATA) bench of the High Court of Sindh on Thursday dismissed an appeal filed by Nadir Shah, an activist of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement sentenced to life term in a case of attacking a patrol party of Sachal Rangers, killing sepoy Dildar Hussain in July 1998.

The appellant challenged his conviction and sentence by the ATC-IV for Karachi division, which sentenced him to life term, a fine of Rs200,000 besides other terms under sections 302, 324, 148, 149 PPC.

Abdul Waheed Kaptar advocate represented the convict/appellant. An order reserved earlier was announced today. According to the prosecution, the appellant in collusion with other accused including the main accused, Junaid alias K-2, Amir alias Miru, Obaid K-2, Asif, Shakeel, Rafique alias Bullet and other activists of the MQM attacked a patrol party of Sachal Rangers, 73 wing in front of Poly Clinic, Liaquatabad while chanting anti-police and rangers slogans.

The accused fired with automatic weapons, killing sepoy Dildar while injuring Hawaldar Mumtaz. Arguing out the appeal, counsel for the appellant submitted that another mobile full with Rangers officials was also available on the spot but its presence was suppressed by the complainant party.

He also submitted that the accused were not named in the FIR, and unknown persons were stated to be culprits in the alleged incident in the station dairy. Habib Ahmed, Assistant Advocate General (AAG) in his submissions supported the conviction and sentence, maintaining that the case of the present appellant was at par with that of Junaid K-2 whose appeal was dismissed by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

The AAG also submitted that the accused/convict was named in the FIR, rebutting the ground that no identification parade of the accused was held. The AAG supplemented his statement by an argument that the accused were known previously to the complainant party, and thus there was no need for an identification parade at the trial stage.

The bench reserved the order after hearing both sides. Announcing the judgement on Thursday, the bench dismissed the appeal holding that there was no merit in the appeal. The bench maintained the conviction and sentence extending benefit of section 382 CrPC to the appellant/convict.

DNA SAMPLES: The provincial law officer on Thursday told the Sindh High Court on Thursday, the DNA samples of Mohammad Ali Khatri, an alleged suicide bomber in the Ali Raza Mosque blast case, matches those of his brothers, which verified that Khatri was the suicide bomber who blew himself up in an attack on the mosque.

The SHC's division bench comprising Chief Justice Saiyed Saeed Ashhad and Justice Syed Zawar Hussain Jaffery was hearing the constitutional petition of Ms Gul Bano in which she alleged that her son, Mohammad Ali Khatri, was in illegal custody of the police, which was avoiding to disclose the detenue's whereabouts.

When the matter was taken up on Thursday, the Additional Advocate General Sarwar Khan placed a letter from the DIG police Headquarters informing the home department that blood samples of Mst Gul Bano, mother of Khatri, and his brothers Gul Jameel and Feroz Hasan were obtained and sent to the director, Centre for Applied Molecular Biology, Lahore along with body pieces of the suicide bomber for a DNA test.

According to the report, it received from the CAMB forensic service lab, the DNA samples of suspect matched those of his brothers Gul Jameel and Hasan Feroz. As such, it had been scientifically verified that the suicide bomber, who expired in the blast incident was indeed Mohammad Ali Khatri.

Earlier, the police stated in its reply that the petition matter pertained to the bomb blast incident that occurred at Imambargah Ali Raza, M.A. Jinnah Road in Karachi on May 31, 2004 in which 25 people were killed and 37 were injured.

Police arrested one accused Gul Hasan, activist of banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, who during interrogation disclosed that he had prepared Mohammad Ali to carry out the suicide bombing at the imambargah. The court after recording the statement of the police dismissed the petition as infructuous. - APP/PPI