PESHAWAR: An anti-terrorism court here on Saturday rejected the petitions of two police stations in Khyber and Kolai-Palas districts for the custody of imprisoned Pashtun National Jirga leader Khan Wali Afridi in other cases.

Mr Afridi was arrested earlier this month after he raised voice against the killing of two children in mortar shelling in Tirah area of Khyber tribal district.

Initially, he was held in a case related to the Torkham Highway blockade by tribesmen over delay in return of internally displaced persons to their native areas where military operation was conducted.

The local police had claimed that the protesting tribesmen including Mr Wali were raising slogans against state institutions.

Khan Wali was held as he decried killing of children in Tirah shelling

However, when he was granted bail in the case, the police arrested him in several other cases, including one registered at Peshawar’s Regi police station on Oct 9 regarding several killings in firing at the venue of the three-day PNJ.

Though Mr Wali, also an academician and principal of a private educational institution in Khyber district - was granted bail in other cases, he is still behind bars as certain legal requirements regarding his bail bonds have to be completed.

Recently, he was also shifted to Chitral over a case of propaganda against state institutions, but a local court discharged that case.

In the meantime, the officials of Landi Kotal and Palas police stations approached the ATC to seek his arrest in two other cases.

Mr Wali’s lawyer Farhad Afridi told Dawn that the police had been misusing the law and trying to keep his client imprisoned by implicating him in fabricated cases as he had been a vocal advocate for civil liberties and opposed excesses of law-enforcement agencies against people.

Landi Kotal circle deputy superintendent of police Malik Mazhar and senior public prosecutor Anwar Khan submitted an application to the ATC for getting the custody of Mr Wali.

They insisted that the detainee was required in a case registered in 2022, which was untraced and was filed on the order of the concerned court.

The ATC’s administrative judge, Mohammad Iqbal Khan, observed that the case was registered in 2022 against unidentified accused, and during investigation, the police couldn’t trace or arrest any person as an accused, so they submitted the case to the court being untraced so that it should be formally filed.

The court observed that the relevant judge at the time of declaring the case untraced, ordered it to be consigned to record room but ruled that as the police traced the real culprit, they could apply for the case’s restoration.

“Giving such a relief to the police amounted to giving a blank cheque to them while keeping such cases in the police station and whenever they desired to implicate or involve any person therein, they came forward with application for arresting an accused confined in any other case in the jail,” it observed.

The judge observed that when the DSP was confronted about how they knew that Khan Wali was involved in the case, he was unable to respond in a legal manner and satisfy the court.

He added that mere nomination of a person in a case couldn’t allow authorities to play with people’s lives, so the plea for collecting the accused from the prison and arresting him in the instant case was not legally justified.

Similarly, the officials of Palas police station sought the transfer of Mr Wali from the prison to Kolai Palas in a case registered against him on Nov 11, 2024, for different offences against the state.

“No case was made out against the accused,” the court declared.

It added that the police were not competent or authorised to register the case without the permission of the competent authority.

Published in Dawn, December 1st, 2024