ISLAMABAD, July 30: The Lahore High Court (LHC) observed on Monday that the Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) enforced by the English colonialists in 1901 was no more in existence, as the Balochistan high Court (Shariat Bench) had declared in 1979 that the law was contrary to the injunctions of Islam.

Justice Saeed Akhtar of the Rawalpindi bench of the LHC made this observation, while hearing a habeas corpus petition of a resident of the tribal areas of the NWFP, who, what the defence counsel insisted was “kept in illegal confinement” for more than two-and-a-half years on the directives of political agent of Bajore Agency.

The court was approached by Qimat Gul through Abdul Rehman Siddiqui advocate, claiming that some people of his village intended to illegally occupy his land and when he had put up resistance, the opponent party had greased the palm of the political agent, who had implicated him under the FCR and had detained him.

The complainant remained in illegal detention for about two-and-a-half years without any right to defend and proper adjudication before any competent judicial authority.

The court was told that the Shariat bench of the Balochistan High Court, on an identical complaint in 1979, had observed that the FCR was repugnant to the injunctions of the Holy Quran and Sunnah, being a discriminatory law, as was reported in PLD 1979 (page 217).

As soon as the petitioner approached the Rawalpindi bench, which exercised jurisdiction on the federally-administered areas as there was no high court of Islamabad, the political agent ordered his release only for 15 days.

When the court took up the matter for adjudication on Monday, it summoned deputy advocate-general (DAG) Sultan Mansoor and the political agent to ask them as to under what law and regulation the complainant had been detained and why he had been denied his constitutional right to self-defence.

Both the DAG and the political agent failed to offer any satisfactory answer, which prompted the court to give them four weeks to clarify their position.