KARACHI, April 15: The provincial law department reappointed on Monday a prosecutor earlier removed for opposing trial under the anti-terror laws for an interim period in the Shahzeb murder case as no proceeding was made in the case on the third consecutive day.

When the matter came up for hearing before the anti-terrorism court on Monday for evidence of prosecution witnesses, the court was informed that the law department had notified Abdul Maroof as special public prosecutor in the case till the return of “ailing” prosecutor Muntazir Mehdi.

The newly-appointed prosecutor appeared before judge Ghulam Mustafa Memon of the ATC-III, who is conducting the trial on a day-to-day basis on an apex court order, on Monday and moved an adjournment application by submitting that he had to study the case and go through the proceedings conducted so far before pleading the case.

Hence, the court adjourned the hearing till Tuesday.

The case was also simply put off on April 12 and April 13 for want of prosecutor.

The special public prosecutor of the case, Muntazir Medhi, had sent an application on April 12 stating that he could not appear before the court to proceed with the case for around a week because of what he claimed ‘illness’ and the court had asked the prosecutor general of Sindh to provide a prosecutor to conduct the case since there were directions from the superior judiciary for timely disposal of the case.

Mr Mehdi had recently submitted a letter in the high court asking it to disengage him from the case as he expressed his inability to conduct the case due to what he described as ‘pressure’ on him.

He was the fourth prosecutor in this case as earlier three had been removed for one reason or another.

Mr Maroof had been the first prosecutor in this case, but he was removed on March 1 on his request to the law department.