A local court in Islamabad on Wednesday extended the physical remand of Zahir Zakir Jaffer, the key suspect in Noor Mukadam murder case, for three more days.

The suspect was initially sent on a three-day remand, which was later extended for two more days on July 24.

The court further extended the remand by three more days on Wednesday after Jaffer was produced before Judicial Magistrate Shoaib Akhtar.

At the hearing, case prosecutor Sajid Cheema told the court that CCTV footage of the incident had been acquired but was yet to be sent for forensic analysis.

He requested the court to grant another three-day remand of the suspect as he, along with the CCTV footage, had to be transported to Lahore for the forensic analysis of the video.

The counsel for the suspect, however, suggested that the relevant authorities use a photograph of Jaffer for forensic analysis and that a further remand for that purpose was not needed.

He added that police had also recovered the suspect's mobile phone and now there were no grounds for extending his remand.

The prosecutor argued back that had a photograph sufficed for the forensic analysis, the request for a further extension of the remand would not have been made in the first place.

He said the suspect in the Usman Mirza case also had to be taken to Lahore as it was necessary to ensure that the footage was not edited.

At that, the counsel for the suspect pointed out that his client's remand period had already been extended to seven days.

"Why wasn't the forensic analysis carried out during that period?" he questioned.

He added that it was the first instance in his knowledge where a request for remand extension had been made to conduct forensic analysis of CCTV footage.

The prosecutor, however, insisted on a three-day extension of the remand.

"Grant a remand for just three days and we will send [Jaffer] to jail after that," he said.

At that, Jaffer's counsel argued that the suspect could be taken to Lahore directly from jail and there was no need to extend his physical remand.

The court, after hearing the arguments, granted the extension.

The case

Noor, 27, daughter of former Pakistani diplomat Shaukat Mukadam, was found murdered at a residence in Islamabad's upscale Sector F-7/4 on July 20.

A first information report (FIR) was registered later the same day against Jaffer, who was arrested from the site of the murder, under Section 302 (premeditated murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code on the complaint of the victim's father.

In his complaint, Shaukat Mukadam had stated that he had gone to Rawalpindi on July 19 to buy a goat for Eidul Azha, while his wife had gone out to pick up clothes from her tailor. When he had returned home in the evening, the couple found their daughter Noor absent from their house in Islamabad.

They had found her cellphone number to be switched off, and started a search for her. Sometime later, Noor had called her parents to inform them that she was travelling to Lahore with some friends and would return in a day or two, according to the FIR, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com.

The complainant said he had later received a call from the suspect, son of Zakir Jaffer, whose family were the ex-diplomat's acquaintances. The suspect had informed Shaukat that Noor was not with him, the FIR said.

At around 10pm on July 20, the victim's father had received a call from Kohsar police station, informing him that Noor had been murdered.

Police had subsequently taken the complainant to Zahir's house in Sector F-7/4 where he discovered that his "daughter has been brutally murdered with a sharp-edged weapon and beheaded", according to the FIR.

Mukadam, who identified his daughter's body, has sought the maximum punishment under the law against Zahir for allegedly murdering his daughter.