KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said on Thursday that the escape of two undertrial prisoners from the Central Jail Karachi in June was the result of criminal negligence by jail officials. He said 15 officials concerned had been arrested in this connection. However, three of them were later released on bail.

Also on Thursday, officials and sources said that investigators probing into the escape of the two undertrial prisoners claimed to have found “key link” that might help police trace them. They said the escapees — who are alleged members of the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi (LJ) — were believed to have stayed for 10 days in a village in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa before travelling to Balochistan.

Talking to reporters after attending the concluding ceremony of the three-day urs of Sufi saint Abdullah Shah Ghazi here, the chief minister said that the escape of the two prisoners could not be ignored because police and other security agencies made hectic efforts to arrest them. The escape from jail was a criminal matter and the government was taking it very seriously and that was the reason it had suspended some senior officials, he added.

Answering a question, Mr Shah said he had no report whether the escapees had fled to Afghanistan or were hidden somewhere in the country. However, he added, “we are in close contact with other provinces and all agencies, including police, Rangers and intelligence agencies, which are working in close coordination to arrest them.”

Investigators find major clue to the escaped militants

Talking about the decision of the Sindh High Court (SHC) of keeping A.D. Khowaja as the inspector general of Sindh police and giving him complete authority, the chief minister said that the government respected the verdict but had reservation on some parts of it. Therefore, he added, the province had decided to challenge the SHC verdict.

Answering a question about the NAB law, the chief minister said PPP co-chairperson and former president Asif Ali Zardari was in favour of strengthening the federation and that was the reason that he had directed the Sindh government to revisit the NAB law, particularly its Sindh section, which had been repealed by the provincial assembly.

Replying to yet another question, the chief minister said had the Green Line project been in any other province it would have been completed much earlier, but the projects of the federal government in Sindh hardly get priority.

‘Sufficient evidence’

Meanwhile, sources said the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) of Sindh police had collected “sufficient evidence” of alleged abetment and criminal conspiracy of 13 jail officials in the escape of the two suspected LJ militants.

Sources in the CTD told Dawn that a prisoner had provided them vital information about the alleged abetment and criminal conspiracy of jail officials in the escape. They said the prisoner besides intimating the jail officials about the possible escape plan had also written a letter to them to this effect. The letter was not in CTD’s custody, they added.

It may be recalled that the undertrial prisoners — Sheikh Mumtaz alias Firaun and Mohammad Ahmed Khan alias Munna of the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi — escaped from the Central Prison Karachi after cutting an iron grill of the lock-up on June 13. They had been arrested by the CTD for their alleged involvement in the killing of over 60 people, mainly Shias and law enforcers.

Subsequent investigations into the escape found that they stayed for 10 days in Haripur village of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa before travelling to Balochistan.

Following their escape, the New Town police registered a case against 12 jail officials on a complaint of the then DIG Prisons over charges of negligence. The case was then transferred to the CTD that invoked Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997, as their escape had caused “fear among the general public and witnesses of pending cases”.

The CTD later arrested three more prison employees on charges of negligence.

The CTD officials investigating the escape said one of the escaped prisoners, Ahmed alias Munna, used to meet his maternal uncle, Azharuddin, inside lock-up in the central prison. They held “long sittings” in the absence of ATC judge, they said.

Published in Dawn, September 15th, 2017