LAHORE, April 7: The Punjab Prosecution Department is not dealing with the Darya Khan cannibals case properly as police had to include terror charges in the FIR on a magistrate's orders, Dawn has learnt. When cannibalism suspects Farman and Arif were produced before the Darya Khan magistrate a few days ago and then before a sessions court judge in Sargodha, no prosecutor was present.
Police had registered a case against the two brothers under section 16 of the Maintenance of Public Order and 295-A, 297 and 201 of the Pakistan Penal Code on the complaint of Ijaz Husain, brother of deceased Saira whose freshly-buried body was exhumed on April 2.Sources say the police after the completion of the investigation on Thursday produced the accused before the Sargodha ATC. As the judge was on leave, the police produced the suspects before a duty judge and got their judicial remand.
Sources said that at the time of producing suspects before the ATC, no prosecutor was present there which showed department's least interest in the case. Punjab Additional Prosecutor General Abdul Samad, however, claimed the court had ordered section 7-ATA in the FIR on the insistence of a department's prosecutor.
“Our prosecutor in Bhakkar is following this case properly,” he said.
He said police had not consulted the department at the initial stage otherwise terror charges would have been included in the FIR then.
