KARACHI, Oct 29: A division bench of the Sindh High Court overturned acquittals by a sessions court in a murder case and awarded death penalty to one of the accused and life term to another.
Khan Mohammad, Alam Sher and three others were tried by a Thatta sessions court for killing Mohammad Khan, owner of a medical store, in 1998. All five accused were acquitted by the trial court for want of independent corroborative evidence to connect them with the commission of the offence.
The state and the private complainant, maternal uncle of the deceased, challenged the acquittals in appeal. Barrister Azizullah K. Shaikh, Assistant Advocate-General Habib Ahmed and Advocate Shamsa Shamim appeared for the appellants and Advocate A.Q. Halepota for respondents.
The appellants' counsel argued that the first information report was lodged almost immediately after the offence. The complainant identified only two of the assailants and did not try to implicate, by name, three 'unknown' attackers who drove to their victim's shop in a jeep.
They were subsequently identified as Zaheer, Punnu and Suleiman. The weapons of offence, a kalashnikov and a pistol belonging to the first two accused, were also recovered.
As for the old enmity between the victim and the assailants, it strengthened the prosecution case by supplying motive instead of weakening it. Victim Mohammad Khan had allegedly killed the brother of one of the accused but was acquitted in the case. The accused took the law into their own hands and murdered Mohammad Khan to avenge the killing.
The division bench, comprising Justices Wahid Bux Brohi and Rehmat Hussain Jafri, upheld the acquittal of three accused but allowed the appeal in respect of the two main accused.
Khan Mohammad and Alam Sher were convicted under Section 302-B of the penal code and sentenced to death and life imprisonment, respectively, and pay a fine of Rs 100,000 each. They were also awarded two years' RI each under Section 148 of the PPC.
RELEASE ORDERED: A Sindh High Court division bench ordered release on personal bonds of a former bank officer simultaneously tried by a banking tribunal and an accountability court and convicted by the latter in absentia.
Former United Bank officer Zahid Umar Faruqui, who has challenged his conviction and sentence of three years' rigorous imprisonment for evading trial before an accountability court, submitted through Advocate Khwaja Naveed Ahmed that he was cited as a witness in two cases involving the Tawakal Group.
Subsequently, he was impleaded as a co-accused. The cases were initially assigned to a special court for banking offences but were transferred to the accountability court without any intimation.
The appellant, who had obtained bail before arrest from the high court in the meanwhile, continued attending the banking court without being told by the investigation officer that the cases had been transferred to the accountability court.
He last appeared in the court on Oct 25. It was only through a newspaper that he learnt of his conviction by the accountability court in the two cases. According to the newspaper report, he had been awarded three years RI each in the two cases in absentia.
Admitting the appeal, a division bench, comprising Justices Wahid Bux Brohi and Rehmat Hussain Jafri, on Friday allowed his plea for release subject to his executing two personal bonds of Rs 100,000 each.
