0
LAHORE, Jan 5: Advocate Rabbiya Bajwa submitted in the Lahore High Court on Wednesday that payment of remuneration to brick kiln workers in advance was unlawful and this plea could hardly justify their detention.
Citing the Bonded Labour (Abolition) Act of 1992, the counsel for Maqbool Masih, who moved a habeas corpus petition against the detention of seven workers at a brick kiln in Pattoki, submitted that the law prohibited giving or taking advance money.
She submitted that kiln owners invariably hid themselves behind an illegal position, which ought to be interpreted and clarified by court. The petition was taken up by Justice Muhammad Nawaz Bhatti, who ordered the Pattoki police to recover and produce on Jan 11 the seven brick kiln workers who, the petitioner alleged, were detained by kiln proprietor Javed for more than two weeks.
The Pattoki police once again expressed their inability to locate the place where the workers were detained. The counsel requested the court if the police failed to produce the missing workers on the next date of hearing, the kiln owner should be charged with abduction. The petition has been lying pending since Dec 28, a week after the workers were detained.
JAILBREAK: The LHC was informed that criminal cases against seven officials of Laksian police station in Sargodha had been registered after the escape of an accused from the lock-up.
The submission before Justice Syed Shabbar Raza Razvi was made by an assistant advocate-general, who opposed a habeas corpus petition moved by Manzooran Bibi, the mother of accused Muhammad Irshad. The accused was detained at the Mandi Bahauddin central jail in a theft case and was taken out by the police for further investigation.
The court disposed of the petition with the observation that it did not form the subject of a habeas corpus petition. The court order came after jail superintendent Malik Ziauddin submitted that he gave the custody of the under-trial prisoner to the police on the orders of a sessions court and an entry to this effect was made in the jail record.
The police submitted that Irshad was lodged at the lock-up for investigation, but escaped by making a hole in the ceiling. The petitioner had contended that her son had been missing under mysterious circumstances and that she feared her son might have met an unfortunate incident. The petitioner stated that her family had an enmity with police constable Mumtaz Husain and the police had taken him out of the jail to kill him in an encounter.
