ISLAMABAD: Justice Aamer Farooq of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Saturday admitted a petition filed by the widow of a group captain of Pakistan Air Force, seeking an investigation into her husband’s death.

After initial hearing the judge issued notices to the defence secretary, local police and medical superintendent of the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) and sought their reply in a fortnight.

The petition cited secretary defence, chief of air staff, deputy chief of air staff and Air Intelligence director general as respondents.

The petitioner Tanzeela Khan requested the IHC to form a joint investigation team (JIT) to investigate how her husband, Group Captain Rizwan Attique, died in August this year.

As per media reports, the group captain was found hanging from a window grille of a room at the PAF headquarters under mysterious circumstances.

The media reports expressed possibility that the officer might have committed suicide.

However, the petition on the other hand alleged that her husband died under the custody of an intelligence agency.

She requested the IHC to issue direction for registration of FIR in this murder case and constitute a JIT comprising officials of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), Islamabad police and Intelligence Bureau (IB) to ascertain the causes and circumstances that led to his death.

The petitioner further requested the court to direct the deputy chief of air staff to provide personal belongings of the deceased officer to legal heirs including his personal files, cheque books and other documents.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2017