KARACHI: An antiterrorism court on Tuesday reissued non-bailable warrant for the arrest of a police inspector, who is absconding in a case pertaining to alleged murder of a teenager registered against eight officials of the Anti-Car Lifting Cell.
The eight ACLC officials — the then SHO Tariq Mehmood, inspectors Azhar Ahsan and Tariq Raheem, head constable Shahid and constables Ghulam Abbas, Fawad Khan, Mohammad Daniyal and Bilal Rasheed — have been charged with killing 19-year-old student Intizar Ahmed on the night of Jan 13 in Defence Housing Authority.
On Tuesday, the matter was fixed before the ATC-XIII judge, who is conducting the trial inside the central jail.
The investigating officer informed that he had not received the non-bailable warrant issued by the court on the last date for arrest of Inspector Tariq Raheem.
The complainant’s counsel, Salahuddin Panhwar, contended that the IO was deliberately avoiding arrest of his fellow police official and extending undue favour to an accused in the murder case.
The complainant Maqsood Ahmed requested the court to order placing the name of the fleeing inspector on the Exit Control List (ECL) apprehending he might leave the country to avoid his arrest.
The judge expressed extreme displeasure over the conduct of the IO over making such an excuse and observed whether it was also the duty of the court to provide him the arrest warrant.
However, the judge directed the office to provide the warrant to the IO in the court and directed him to execute the same on the absconding police official.
The IO was further directed to arrest and produce the absconding policeman on the next date and fixed the matter on October 10.
On June 11, the court had recalled interim pre-arrest bail granted earlier to accused Tariq Raheem. It had also dismissed post-arrest bail pleas of the then SHO Tariq Mehmood and constable Fawad Sherwani, who were already in judicial custody.
All undertrial policemen were on May 15 indicted for murdering the student, who was studying in Malaysia, and was visiting his family in DHA, Karachi.
Published in Dawn, September 26th, 2018
