ISLAMABAD: Nov 11: The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed the government’s appeal against a Lahore High Court (LHC) decision to acquit a former MNA on charges of drugs smuggling.

A three-member bench, comprising Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, Justice Ijazul Hassan and Justice Chaudhry Ejaz Yousaf, had taken up identical appeals filed by the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) against the acquittal of Munawar Hussain Manj, a former member of the standing committee on narcotics.

The appeals also objected to the commutation of the death sentence of the two co-accused to life imprisonment. The court dismissed the appeals on grounds that the co-accused had already served jail terms.

The ANF had recovered 35 kilograms of heroin and 30kgs of Charas from a car with a PPP flag on its number plate on the Lahore-Sheikhupura Road in April 1995.

The car’s driver Mohammad Siddiq was accompanied by gunman Abdus Sattar.

Khawaja Sultan, representing the ANF, told the court that during interrogation, Siddiq and Sattar had confessed that contraband items belonged to Munawar Hussain Manj who had contested previous general elections on the PPP ticket from Sheikhupura but later changed his loyalty and joined the PML-Q.

On August 2001, a special anti-narcotics court had sentenced the three to death and fined Mr Manj Rs1 million rupee.

But the LHC, on Jan 28, 2003, commuted the capital punishment of Mohammad Siddiq and Abdus Sattar, to life imprisonment, but exonerated Mr Manj from drugs smuggling charges.