KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) has expressed resentment against provincial authorities over a delay in providing financial assistance to the families of the victims of enforced disappearance and directed the home secretary to file a detailed report.

It also asked the home secretary to provide details till Nov 1 about the compensation so far paid to the families as well as the pending cases.

The court further directed the authorities to use modern devices to locate the whereabouts of the missing persons as it was the duty of the state to trace such persons.

A two-judge bench headed by Justice Naimatullah Phulpoto passed such directives while hearing a set of identical petitions seeking the whereabouts of the missing persons.

It observed that the SHC had passed directives for financial help in several cases of the “enforced disappearance”, but positive response was not received from the home department.

“Secretary to the government of Sindh, home department, is directed to look into the matter and file his specific response, else to appear in person on the next date of hearing. Home secretary shall also submit the report regarding the cases in which compensation has been paid to the families of missing persons and the details of the cases which are still pending before him,” it added.

The bench also asked the ministries of interior and defence to collect reports from the agencies working under their control in respect of the missing persons and file all such reports before it till the next hearing.

It deplored that most of the cases were discussed before the joint investigation team (JIT) and provincial taskforce (PTF) for missing persons, but still police were clueless to trace the whereabouts of those missing persons and the petitioners were losing hope.

The bench also came down hard on police for filing stereotype and unsatisfactory reports in several cases and ordered to repeat sessions of the JIT and PTF before the next hearing.

It further passed directives to the deputy inspector general (DIG) of police (investigation) to look into these cases and appoint senior officers to hold further probe in some of such cases.

Earlier, the bench had directed the home department for provision of compensation as per rules in over one dozen cases after the police and provincial law officers informed it from time to time that the cases of the missing persons were categorised as “enforced disappearance”.

In 2021, the SHC had put the federal and provincial on notice with direction to apprise it as to how the families of the missing persons could be provided with financial assistance in the cases where the family heads had gone missing and families were suffering due to financial crises.

In April last year, a provincial law officer had informed the SHC that one-time compensation of Rs500,000 for each family of 12 missing persons, whose cases fell within the category of “enforced disappearance”, was being provided.

Published in Dawn, October 25th, 2023