PESHAWAR, Nov 21: A two-member bench of the Peshawar High Court on Wednesday set aside the sentence awarded by the district and sessions judge of Nowshera to two women in a drug pushing case.

The bench, comprising Justice Nasirul Mulk and Justice Tariq Pervaiz, accepted the plea of Kulsoom and Shehnaz against the criminal case and acquitted them both.

The bench observed that the prosecution had not proved its case against the appellants, and doubt persisted about the quantity of narcotics allegedly recovered from their possession.

The appellants were sentenced to five years imprisonment and fined Rs200,000 each by the sessions judge of Nowshera on Oct 17.

Kulsoom and Shehnaz were travelling in a bus on July 31, 2001, when they were arrested by the customs officials near Amangarh in Nowshera. A woman constable after conducting their body search claimed to have recovered 2kg heroin from their possession each.

The customs department had also charged Saadia, 3, daughter of Kulsoom; and Aqil, 5, son of Shehnaz. Later, the children were acquitted before the commencement of the trial as they were too young to face the trial. They were, however, living with their mothers in the prison.

Advocate Noor Alam Khan appeared for the appellants and contended that the customs officials had allegedly recovered eight packets of heroin from the two appellants. But, he added, according to a forensic science laboratory report only a single sample had been received by the lab. The counsel argued that the laboratory report was about only a single packet, which made the authenticity of the customs’ claim about the rest of the packets doubtful.

The counsel said the woman constable had claimed that the women were on the bus, whereas the concerned inspector in his examination had said that when he boarded the bus he had not spotted any woman inside.

Referring to Section 3 of the Control of Narcotics Substance Act, the lawyer argued that the calculation of the percentage of the banned narcotics in the seized consignment was a mandatory provision. However, he contended, when the trial court was convicting the appellants it had not taken into consideration that point. He said the chemical examination report had only indicated the presence of heroin in the sample, but had not stated whether the seized contraband was pure heroin.