KARACHI: An Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) on Thursday remanded former senior superintendent of police Rao Anwar into police custody for a month for the murder of Naqeebullah Mehsud.

The former SSP and 10 of his detained subordinates and 14 absconding ones are accused of abducting Naseemullah, also known as Naqeebullah Mehsud, for ransom and killing him, along with three other detainees, in a staged encounter in Malir on Jan 13. The cops had dubbed it an encounter against militants.

On Wednesday, police took Anwar into custody from the Supreme Court where he finally turned up after remaining in hiding for nearly two months.

Under directions of the trial court, Investigating Officer SSP Abid Qaimkhani produced the suspect before ATC-II amid strict security on Thursday.

At the outset of the hearing, the IO moved an application before the ATC-II judge asking her to grant him time, because the former SP would have to be produced first before an administrative judge of the ATCs and then before the trial court.

However, the ATC judge, who had issued arrest warrants for Anwar at the last hearing after the administrative judge sent the case to ATC-II for trial, dismissed the application and directed the IO to produce him before the trial court without delay.

A visibly calm Anwar escorted by the police was brought to the ATC in an armoured personnel carrier escorted by nearly a dozen vans of the police and Rangers.

The IO sought custody of the former SSP for 30 days to interrogate him on the grounds that producing him in court could present a security risk. The court handed the suspect over to police custody on physical remand till April 21, and directed the IO to bring him along with a progress report at the next hearing. Although the police have already filed interim and final charge sheets against Anwar before the court, under Section 512 (record of evidence in absence of accused) of the Criminal Code of Procedure, the investigation conducted so far apparently has no value because the apex court has appointed a new joint investigation team (JIT) comprising officials of the Sindh police to grill the suspended police officer.

Earlier, the police had stated in the charge sheet that two witnesses, who had been picked up with Naqeeb, had said in their statements recorded by a judicial magistrate that some policemen in plain clothes had picked them up along with Naqeeb. They said the cops then took them to the Sachal police post, where they were separated from Naqeeb, and when one of them asked why they had been abducted, a cop replied that they were being taken to see Anwar, and then they (the detainees) would be sent to heaven.

Later, the witnesses said they were taken to an unidentified location where they saw Naqeeb. One of them asked Naqeeb what was happening, and he told them that the police were demanding Rs1 million for his release, but he could not even arrange Rs50,000.

The investigation reports add that the witnesses testified that after two days, a policeman told them that they had forgiven them and dropped them on the Super Highway. They found out through the media that Anwar and his associates had killed Naqeeb and three others in a staged encounter in Shah Latif Town on Jan 13.

The witnesses had correctly identified some of the now detained policemen during an identification parade before a judicial magistrate.

The IO also cited the statement of a head constable, said to be a close aide of then Shah Latif Town SHO Amanullah Marwat, in the interim charge sheet.

The policeman stated that on Jan 13, Marwat had called him to the site of the incident where he saw the SHO and other police officials, as well as the four detained men. He said that Anwar, DSP Qamar Ahmed Shaikh, then Sohrab Goth SHO Shoaib Shaikh and other police officials arrived at the scene and Marwat and Shoaib took the detained men to an abandoned poultry farm.

He said they heard gunshots, after which Marwat and other policemen walked out of the poultry farm and asked him to complete the paperwork, adding that he found the bodies of the detained men in the building.

A case was registered on Jan 23, on a complaint filed by Naqeeb’s father, against Anwar and others in the light of the findings of a three-member inquiry committee, which said that prima facie, the encounter was coordinated, fake and staged. Moreover, the police had also told the court that the five cases registered against Naqeeb and three other deceased victims, after they were killed in the staged encounter, were bogus.

Published in Dawn, March 23rd, 2018