KARACHI, Jan 19: A division bench of the Sindh High Court issued notices to the federal and provincial attorneys on Monday in an application seeking reopening of proceedings on a petition about the May 12, 2007, mayhem in Karachi.

Applicant S.M. Iqbal Kazmi stated that he had filed a petition in respect of the mayhem late in May 2007 from jail through Advocate Naheed Afzal. The petition was taken up by a seven-member bench along with other petitions but he decided to withdraw his petition and it was disposed of as withdrawn by the bench.

The petitioner said in his urgent application that he took the decision to withdraw his petition under coercion as he was behind bars and was also receiving threats at that time. “I was forced to make a request for withdrawal”, the applicant said, requesting the court to restore his petition, which cited Muttahida Qaumi Movement leader Altaf Hussain, the then chief secretary and home secretary, the federal interior secretary, the Rangers and others as respondents. The applicant said a new full bench should be constituted to hear the petition.

The division bench, which consisted of Justices Khilji Arif Hussain and Arshad Noor Khan, referred to the record and observed that the petition was disposed of as withdrawn in November 2007. The seven-member bench, however, continued to hear identical cases.

The division bench decided to hear the advocate-general and a deputy attorney-general on the question of maintainability of the application. Notices were accordingly ordered to be issued to the law officers for a date to be fixed by the office.

According to the record, all petitions and applications about the mayhem under consideration of the seven-member bench were disposed of early in 2008 by a newly-constituted five-member bench headed by the then SHC chief justice, Justice Mohammad Afzal Soomro. — Staff Reporter