KARACHI, Aug 17: A special court for the Control of Narcotic Substances (CNS) on Wednesday sentenced a drug peddler to five years in prison.

The court found Mohammad Jameel guilty of keeping two kilograms of hashish within the remit of the Korangi Industrial Area police station in July 2010.

The judge of the special CNS court-II, Sanaullah Khan Ghoury, pronounced the judgment after recording statements of witnesses and final arguments from both sides.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs50,000 and in case of non-payment the convict would have to undergo an additional one-month imprisonment.

The verdict said that prosecution witnesses had fully supported the case; they were subjected to lengthy cross-examination, but their evidence remained unshaken.

It further stated that the accused had failed to produce anything on record to establish any enmity with the policemen for his false implication in the present case while the prosecution had brought confidence-inspiring evidence before the court.

The chemical report also supported the case of the prosecution and from the perusal of the evidence of three witnesses and the recovery of hashish, the charge against the accused had been proved beyond a shadow of a doubt, it concluded.

The judge also ruled that the convict was entitled to benefit of the period he had spent as an undertrial prisoner as provided under Section 382-B of the criminal procedure code.

According to the prosecution, acting on a tip-off the police conducted a raid in Mehran Town on July 27, 2010 and arrested the accused and found two kilograms of hashish in his possession.

A case (FIR 741/10) was registered against him under Section 6/9-C of the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 at the Korangi Industrial Area police station.

The accused was produced in court in custody and after the pronouncement of the order the judge remanded him back to prison with the conviction warrant to serve out the remainder of his sentence.

Meanwhile, the same court on Wednesday acquitted a Hindu priest in a similar case for want of evidence.

The police picked up Wish Ram outside a temple within the remit of the Eidgah police station on June 18 and claimed to have recovered 1.5kg of hashish from him.

However, the court ruled that the witnesses had not specifically deposed against the accused and the investigation officer had conducted inconclusive investigation as he neither inspected the place of the incident nor completed other formalities.

It seemed that the recovery was foisted upon the accused as the prosecution had failed to produce any solid evidence against him to link him with the alleged offence, it added.

The accused was in custody and the court directed the jail authorities to release him if not wanted in any other case.

Two ‘arsonists’ identified in court

A judicial magistrate on Wednesday recorded the statement of an eyewitness who also identified two suspects in a case pertaining to an arson attack on a minibus.

Khanzada and Mohammad Shafi, said to be activists of a political party, along with over a dozen of absconding accomplices have been charged with allegedly setting a minibus on fire on the night of Aug 12 in Keamari in an arson attack that left three people dead and as many others injured.The judicial magistrate (west), Mohammad Afzal Roshan, recorded the testimony of Mohammad Rehan, the conductor of the minibus, under Section 164 of the criminal procedure code in the presence of both suspects.

The witness deposed that the minibus had started its journey from Keamari at around 10pm on Aug 12 and when it reached near the Humayun Centre in Jackson around 16 to 17 armed men attacked the vehicle which was carrying a reasonable number of passengers.

They sprinkled petrol on the minibus and set it on fire before the passengers could even get off, he added.

During his statement, the witness also identified both the suspects and said that they were among the attackers who set the vehicle on fire.According to the prosecution, a man was burnt to death and five others were injured when the minibus of route W-11 was set on fire in Keamari on the eve of a strike called by nationalist parties in Sindh.

The strike call was given in protest against the restoration of the 2001 local government system to the province. Later, two more victims succumbed to their injuries.

The police managed to apprehend two suspects.

On Aug 13, the administrative judge of the anti-terrorism courts in Karachi handed over both the suspects to police on physical remand till Aug 20.