KARACHI: An antiterrorism court on Saturday reserved its order till June 13 on an application moved by a Rangers prosecutor for recording testimony of a judicial magistrate in a case against former federal minister Dr Asim Hussain pertaining to alleged treatment and harbouring of suspected terrorists at his hospitals.

Dr Asim, a close aide to former president Asif Ali Zardari, with five others has been charged with treating and harbouring suspected terrorists, political militants and gangsters at the North Nazimabad and Clifton branches of his hospital at the behest of some politicians.

Others booked in the case including Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan’s Amir Khan, Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhtar, Rauf Siddiqui, Pak Sarzameen Party president Anis Kaimkhani, PPP leader Abdul Qadir Patel and Pasban leader Usman Moazzam.

Counsel for Dr Asim opposes the plea as ‘meritless’

On Saturday, the ATC-II judge took up an application filed by Special Public Prosecutor for Rangers Sajid Mehboob Shaikh under Section 540 of the criminal procedure code.

In the application, the prosecutor mentioned that the investigating officer of the case, DSP Altaf Hussain, had supplied the copies of documentary evidence of the case to the counsel for the parties.

It further mentioned that the a list of 19 prosecution witnesses, including a judicial magistrate (East), who had recorded the alleged confessional statement of a witness, Dr Yousuf Sattar, the then managing director of the Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Hospitals.

The prosecutor argued that later the IO filed a final charge sheet in court in which he listed 16 witnesses and excluded judicial magistrate and two others from it.

Therefore, the court was pleaded to allow the application and summon the judicial magistrate concerned for recording his statement along with the record of the alleged confessional statement of Dr Sattar.

On the other hand, Dr Asim’s counsel, Amir Raza Naqvi, opposed the application and pleaded to the court to dismiss the same for being meritless. He also filed written objections.

Defence counsel for others adopted his arguments.

After hearing arguments from both sides, the court reserved the order on the application and fixed the matter on June 13.

The Rangers had picked up Dr Asim, chairman of the Sindh Higher Education Commission with the status of a provincial minister, from his office in Clifton on Aug 26, 2015. The following day, the Rangers informed an ATC that he was placed under three-month preventive detention for inquiry under Section 11-EEEE of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), claiming that they had credible information about his involvement for using embezzled funds to finance terrorism.

Later, the paramilitary force handed him over to police after lodging a case against him and others for allegedly treating and harbouring terrorists and gangsters.

A case was registered at the North Nazimabad police station under Sections 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence or giving false information to screen offender), 202 (intentional omission to give information of offence by person bound to inform), 216 (harbouring offender who has escaped from custody whose apprehension has been ordered), 216-A (harbouring robbers or dacoits), 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant or banker, merchant or agent) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Sections 21-I (abetment), 21-J (harbouring any person who committed an offence under this act) and 7 of the ATA, 1997.

Published in Dawn, May 20th, 2019