April 04, 2008	Friday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 26, 1429

KARACHI, April 3: The Sindh High Court directed the federal interior ministry to remove the name of Pir Mazharul Haq, former provincial law minister who has been designated leader of the parliamentary party in the Sindh Assembly by the Pakistan People’s Party, from the exit control at the earliest as per undertaking given by a federal attorney and the National Accountability Bureau counsel.

Mr Haq was placed on the exit control on April 30, 1997, following two ehtesab (accountability) cases filed against him during the Nawaz Sharif government. He was convicted in both and handed down hard labour for five years and a fine of Rs2 million in one and rigorous imprisonment for two years and a fine of Rs200,000 in the other. The Supreme Court set aside his conviction and punishment in the former and the National Reconciliation Ordinance quashed proceedings in the latter. In the meanwhile, he approached the high court against the foreign travel ban clamped on him.

Deputy Attorney-General Rizwan Ahmed Siddiqui and NAB counsel Mohammad Ali Waris Lari informed the division bench seized of Mr Haq’s petition that no case was pending against him. His name should have been taken off the ECL after termination of cases, they said, and requested the bench to give them 24 hours to ensure deletion of his name from the ECL. Advocate Mohammad Aslam Butt, the petitioner’s counsel, did not press the petition following the law officers’ assurance.

Disposing of the petition, the bench, which consisted of Justices Mrs Qaiser Iqbal and Syed Mahmood Alam Rizvi, directed the interior ministry to omit the petitioner’s name from the ECL at the earliest and asked the DAG to ensure compliance.

Aamir’s plea adjourned

The division bench adjourned on Thursday the hearing of an appeal filed by the central leader of the Muhajir Quami Movement-Haqiqi, Aamir Khan, till April 16 for want of time, add agencies.

The appellant has challenged his conviction and sentence by an anti-terrorism court in a double murder case.

According to the prosecution, MQM-H activists fired and killed two workers of the rival faction on the day of a by-election to a National Assembly seat. The killing was alleged to be at the behest of the accused/ appellant.

‘Illegal detention’

A division bench of the Sindh High Court on Thursday issued notices to the home secretary, inspector-general of the Sindh Police, deputy inspector-general, investigation, Sindh, director-general of the Rangers and others for April 22, 2008 on a petition filed against the illegal detention of Adnan.

Petitioner Siddique Ahmed, father of Adnan, approached the SHC through his counsel, Advocate Maqbool-ur-Rehman, and submitted that his son was picked up by the personnel of law-enforcement agencies and a police party headed by the Mehmoodabad police station house officer on March 30, 2008, when he was sitting at his friend’s mobile shop.

He submitted that the personnel, after picking up his son, raided their house in Mehmoodabad and forcefully searched and took away Rs15,000 cash, the computerized national identity card of the petitioner and other valuables.

He feared that the law-enforcement agencies would implicate his son in a false case and they might kill him in a fake encounter. He feared that his son might be handed over to some other country. He prayed to the court to direct the respondents to produce the detainee in court and initiate legal proceedings against them. He also requested the court to restrain the respondents from handing over his son to another country.