PESHAWAR, Oct 27: A local court here on Thursday ordered registration of an FIR against two police officials for keeping four persons in alleged illegal detention for several days.

The court of additional district and sessions judge directed the officials of Hayatabad police station to register FIR till Nov 2 against a former SHO of the said station, Shaukat Khan, and a chief investigation officer, Sikander Khan.

The court ordered that after registration of the case the court should be informed about it. The judge directed that the copy of the order should be sent to the additional inspector general of police (investigation) and chief of capital city police.

The judge issued the order under section 22-A of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) under which the court had the powers of justice of peace and it could issue order for registration of FIRs.

The issue had surfaced when a judicial magistrate, Qudratullah Khan, had visited Hayatabad police station on Sept 12 and found four persons detained apparently without registration of a case. The detained persons were identified as Shakeel, Ajmal, Ghulam Rasool and Akhter Mohammad.

The magistrate in his report stated that arrest of the four persons were also not shown on record and at that time there was no case registered against them. He directed police to produce the detained persons before the court.

However, they were produced before the court four days later on Sept 16 and were charged in an untraced theft case. To justify delay in their production before the court, the SHO claimed that they had set them free on bail and arrested them again four days later.

The district public prosecutor, Saleem Khan, had also given his opinion and stated that the police officials had committed illegality by keeping those persons in wrongful confinement.

The magistrate had also sent a report to Peshawar High Court and its Human Rights Cell referred the said report to the district and sessions judge, Mr Ziauddin Khattak, to treat it as a petition under section 22-A of CrPC.

Controversy had emerged after the visit of the magistrate to the station as few days later when he was returning home, situated in the limits of Hayatabad police station, he was stopped by armed policemen on excuse of checking his vehicle.

He claimed that the policemen aimed their guns at him and conducted his body search besides checking his vehicle thoroughly.

Following that incident, the SHO was transferred to Gulbahar police station.