KARACHI, June 23: The District and Sessions Judge East, Sain Ali Dino Matilo, issued on Monday a show-cause notice to the home secretary of Sindh for not producing Asif Ali Zardari in court for the hearing in the Mir Murtaza Bhutto murder case.

The case was transferred to the district and session judge east in August last year after Judge Yasmin Abbasi of Small Cause Court had refused to try the case six months before its transfer.

Mir Murtaza Bhutto, son of late prime minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and the younger brother of the then prime minister Benazir Bhutto, was killed along with six others including his close aide Ashiq Jatoi, in September 1996 in Clifton area during an alleged shootout.

The judge had issued a show-cause notice after the provincial home secretary informed the court through a letter that Mr Zardari was in custody of the jail authorities in the Punjab where he was facing trial in different cases.

The judge ordered the home secretary to submit the reply to the notice within 10 days.

The judge also ordered the authorities to produce Mr Zardari on July 5 in court for the hearing of the case.

Asif Ali Zardari former DIG of Karachi, Shoaib Suddle, former superintendent of police, south, Wajid Durrani, former chief of the intelligence bureau, Masood Sharif, former SP of Saddar, Shahid Hiyat, former ASP of Darakhshan, Rai Mohammed Tahir, former SHO of Garden police station, Shabbir Ahmed Qaimkhani, former SHO of Napier PS, Agha Mohammed Jameel, ASI Abdul Basit, head constables Muslim Shah and Faisal Hafeez, and constables Zafar Iqbal, Zulfiqar Ahmed, Ghulam Mustafa, Ahmed Khan, Raja Hameed, Gulzar Khan, Zakir Mehmood and Ghulam Shabbir were the arrested accused in the case.

All of them have been granted bail.

The trial of Mir Murtaza Bhutto case has come to a halt since the deposition of the 17th prosecution witness out of 223 due to the fact that the prime accused Asif Ali Zardari could not be produced before the court.

The court had recorded the statement of Ghulam Mustafa, a worker of Mir Murtaza and eye witness to the case, in July 2000 and the PW is yet to be cross-examined by the defence counsel.

Zardari, who was granted bail in the case in last December, has not been produced before the court despite repeated notices to the jail authorities and the Sindh home department.

The husband of the former prime minister, facing trial in over 13 cases, was arrested on November 5, 1996 at the Punjab Governor House initially under the Maintenance of Public Order (MPO), following the dismissal of the Benazir government by the then president Muhammed Farooq Leghari.

All the accused in the case are on bail. The last arrested accused in the Mir Murtaza Bhutto case, a head constable, was granted bail on Monday by the trial court.

The five different courts trying Asif Ali Zardari in six cases, have issued over 270 orders for his production during the past two years. However, none of them was ever complied with.

Police effected his arrest in the Mir Murtaza Bhutto murder case late November 1996 after the Sindh High Court set aside his detention under MPO.