KARACHI, Oct 30: A division bench of Sindh High Court, comprising Justice Wahid Bux Brohi and Justice Rehmat Hussain Jaffery, on Wednesday convicted two acquitted accused involved in a kidnapping case and sent them to judicial custody to serve out the sentence.

The state, through the assistant advocate-general, Sindh, Habib Ahmed, preferred a criminal acquittal appeal against the acquittal of Ikram and Shahid, who were acquitted by the ATC I, then headed by Syed Zakir Hussain, on July 30, 2001.

The trial court judge recording the acquittal said that initially a missing report was lodged and none of the mushirs to the recovery of alleged kidnapped boy was from the locality from where the alleged recovery was made.

The AAG submitted that the victim was an 18-year-old boy and he had implicated the accused. He further contended that although the accused were previously known to the victim, there was no previous enmity between them.

The AAG also submitted that the father of the victim and a neighbour, Malik Farooq, were present when the kidnapped boy was recovered from a house in New Karachi, 5-J, near Khayyam bus stop, on Feb 18, 2001.

Relying on a number of judgments by the superior courts, AAG Habib Ahmed submitted that only the statement of the kidnapped victim was sufficient for convicting the accused.

He requested the court to set aside the judgment of the trial court and convict the accused.

According to the prosecution, on Feb 12, 2001 Ikram and Shahid who had previously worked at an electric store in the Lines Area, where kidnap victim Muhammed Salman lived, asked him to push their Suzuki pickup. One of the accused and the victim pushed the vehicle to start. They then asked Salman that where he was going and then offered him a lift to his destination (PIB Colony).

About midway they took him away at gunpoint. The accused later made phone calls and demanded a ransom of Rs1 million. During negotiations the phone booth from where the accused were making calls was located by the police with the help of the CPLC.

The police lay a trap and grabbed them red-handed. The victim, blindfolded and his hands tied with a piece of electric wire, was recovered from the house of accused Shahid.

The accused were then sent up for trial and were acquitted against which the present appeal was filed. Advocate Aftab Bano Rajput represented the accused.

The bench, on Wednesday allowing the appeal set aside the judgment by the trial court and held the accused guilty of kidnapping for ransom. The bench then sentenced the accused to serve a life-term on charge of kidnapping and also sentenced them to serve 7 year RI for keeping illegal arms.

The accused present in the court were taken into custody and remanded in judicial custody for serving out the sentence.

The same bench, hearing another appeal by a convict, Muhammed Kamran, dismissed the appeal but reduced the 10-year imprisonment to five years in a motorcycle snatching case.

The accused was sentenced by an ATC for taking away a motorcycle from Muhammed Yousuf in the Chakiwara police jurisdiction.—APP