MUZAFFARABAD: The bail application of two suspects charged with harassment, extortion and criminal intimidation of a couple on the outskirts of the capital some time ago was rejected by a judicial magistrate, here the other day.

On January 17, a video clip had gone viral on social media wherein two persons were seen roughing up a man at the wheel of a car in a largely uninhabited Langarpura satellite town.

The man who was accompanied by a woman was heard repeatedly assuring the thugs of meeting their demand for money amid their attempts to molest the distressed female.

After preliminary investigations, the city police station Muzaffarabad had registered an FIR, by becoming plaintiffs themselves, naming Hafeez and Danish as key suspects who were arrested by a police team the same day.

Along with them, Shafqat, the younger sibling of Hafeez, was also taken into custody by the police, assuming that he had filmed the incident.

However, Shafqat was set free after a few days when it emerged that he was not guilty and the video was shot by another person, who had fled to Lahore from where he had leaked the clip after a falling-out with Hafeez. Both Hafeez and Danish were remanded in police custody by a magistrate until January 29 for investigations.

According to SHO Rashid Habib Masoodi, police had recovered some six mobile phones, three snatched from the couple alone, from their custody which suggested that they had been involved in illicit activities for long with impunity.

On Wednesday, district and sessions judge Muzaffarabad Munir Ahmed Farooqi took up the duo’s bail application filed by their counsel. However, after hearing arguments from both sides and perusing the record, the judge held that the suspects could not be granted bail because section 20 of the Prohibition (Enforcement of Hadd)Act, 1985 in the FIR constituted a non-bailable offence.

Even if this section had not been clamped, the suspects were liable to be denied bail because firstly they had been on police remand until January 29 for the purpose of interrogations and secondly the items they had snatched from the victims had been recovered by the police from their custody.

According to SHO Masoodi, police had also apprehended the third suspect the other day. On Wednesday, he was separately produced before the court of senior civil judge Muzaffarabad which remanded him in police custody until January 29.

Published in Dawn, January 28th, 2022