LAHORE: Hearing a petition against illegal detention of Ramzan Sugar Mill employee’s wife and his four children, the Lahore High Court on Wednesday came down on Punjab police and placed the Chiniot Saddar station house officer under court arrest.

Justice Mazhar Iqbal Sidhu also summoned the DPO and other police officials.

A bailiff had recovered Amina Ali and her four children from Sadar police station of Chiniot. Woman’s maternal uncle Prof Mustajab Qureshi had filed the petition for the recovery of the mother and her children.

Advocate Aftab Ahmad Bajwa, petitioner’s counsel, told the court Salman Shahbaz, son of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, got Muhammad Ali, husband of Amina, abducted through police and shifted to unknown place. Ali was assistant cane manager at the sugar mill belonged to Sharif family, he said.

The counsel said a police team raided the house of Ali and also picked up his wife along with the minors.

Amina, a position holder in her master’s degree from Punjab University, told the court she was a teacher in a government school. She said the police also abducted her mother from their Model Town (Lahore) house and later threw her outside the house. Requesting the court to get her husband recovered, she burst into tears.

Sadar SHO Muhammad Younas denied the charges and told the court he never saw the woman before.

Justice Sidhu lamented that the falsity of police department had become a universal truth. He observed the affairs of Punjab police were more depressing than other provinces rather it had become an unbridled horse.

The judge got the SHO arrested by the court’s security and summoned the Chiniot DPO along with other police officials on the next hearing. He also directed the petitioner’s counsel to bring the mother of Amina and her children in the court on Thursday (today).

Published in Dawn, January 29th, 2015

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