QUETTA: Balochistan Home Minister Mir Sarfaraz Ahmed Bugti has ordered an inquiry into the recording of a video statement of death row prisoner Saulat Mirza.

Talking to newsmen in the office of National Database and Registration Authority here on Thursday, he said: “How pictures and a video statement of a death-row prisoner can be taken in his cell without informing the jail superintendent.”

The minister said he didn’t think the video statement of Saulat Mirza was recorded in Mach Jail. “I have ordered an inquiry into the matter,” he said.

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He endorsed the statement of Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan that the execution of Saulat Mirza was postponed for 72 hours because he was not well.

Mr Bugti said Saulat Mirza fell unconscious in the death cell after midnight. The provincial home department informed the interior ministry about continuing unconsciousness of Saulat Mirza. The interior ministry took up the matter with the Presidency which ordered postponement of execution for 72 hours, he added.

Replying to a question about presenting Saulat Mirza before a court in Quetta, the minister said there was no case registered against him in any area of Balochistan.

When contacted, Superintendent of Mach Jail Ishaq Zehri said the video statement of Saulat Mirza had not been recorded in jail. He said all arrangements for execution of Saulat Mirza had been completed. According to him, the orders to put off the execution for 72 hours were received at about 2.30am.

Sources said Saulat Mirza was still in the death cell and had not been shifted to any other place and a large number of security personnel deployed in and around Mach Jail had not been withdrawn.

Official sources said the wife, sister, brother and other relatives of Saulat Mirza, who had come to meet him for the last time, had been taken to Quetta under tight security on Thursday.

MQM workers who had gathered outside the jail left after the postponement of execution.

Published in Dawn, March 20th, 2015

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