MANSEHRA, Sept 4: Despite a request by the Sindh home department, the mastermind of the Karachi jail bomb plot, who was arrested in a murder case here and had fled from the Haripur prison, has not been brought to the NWFP because of refusal of the inspector-general of prisons of the Frontier province to bear the expenses of his shifting, Dawn learnt on Tuesday.

The Sindh home department, in a letter on June 8, had asked its counterpart in the NWFP to shift Khuram Malik to the province as the mercy petition of his mother had been turned down by the president.

But the NWFP prisons IG replied that his department could not bear the travel expenses of the prisoner.

The Sindh home department had advised shifting of the prisoner by air under tight security, saying that he was dangerous and he had previously escaped from the Haripur prison.

He was arrested in Karachi on April 22, 2002.

Mr Malik had killed his first year class fellow Ijaz in Mansehra in 1998 and chopped his body into pieces.

He and four other inmates, all alleged activists of a banned Jihadi group, on May 21, 2004, planned to destroy the Karachi Central Prison’s ward No.19 by detonating a bomb to escape but their plot was unearthed and devices were seized from their possession.

An uncle of victim Ijaz, Mohammad Nazeer said: “Khuram killed my nephew, the court awarded him death sentence and his mothers’ mercy petition has been turned down by the president but he has not been brought to Haripur prison despite appeals to the Sindh, NWFP and federal governments.”

He said Khuram was a prisoner of the NWFP caught in Karachi and it was the responsibility of the NWFP prison department to bring him back.