SC issues arrest warrants for PML-N lawmaker

Published November 19, 2015
The bench says that a compromise is not allowed in a case registered under ATA.
The bench says that a compromise is not allowed in a case registered under ATA.

GUJRAT: The Supreme Court issued on Wednesday arrest warrants for PML-N’s Member of the National Assembly Chaudhary Abid Raza of Kotla. The MNA had been sentenced to death in the murder case of six people in Gujrat under the Anti-Terrorism Act, but was freed after a compromise with the aggrieved.

Elected from NA-107 in 2013 elections, Mr Raza had been sentenced to death by a Gujranwala ATC back in 2001. A three-judge SC bench headed by Chief Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali, while hearing a case related to Raza’s disqualification, took notice of his acquittal in the terrorism case.

Also read: Ex-PML-N lawmaker, 50 others booked

The bench said that a compromise was not allowed in a case registered under ATA (1997) and issued the arrest warrants and adjourned the hearing for two weeks.

Chaudhary Ilyas of PTI who lost the NA-107 election has sought Raza’s disqualification because of his conviction under the ATA and some other reasons. The Gujrat incident in which Mr Raza was convicted had taken place in 1998 when six people on a jeep were killed in an ambush.

Published in Dawn, November 19th, 2015

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