KARACHI, Jan 16: A sub-inspector and an assistant sub-inspector on Monday were taken into police custody and stripped of their badges on a court order for falsely booking an elderly man in an illicit weapon case.

SI Nazeer Ahmed Abro and ASI Shahid Hussain Jaffery had arrested a 60-year-old security guard, Mohammad Younus, in September 2011 within the remit of the Awami Colony police station for keeping an unlicensed weapon.

However, a judicial magistrate acquitted him of the charge after the latter produced a licence of the weapon, which he claimed had been given to him by his employer (private security agency), in court.

On Monday when both the police officials appeared before the judicial magistrate (east), Aleem Ahmed, and filed their replies, the court expressed dissatisfaction with the answers and ordered that the officials be taken into policecustody and also be stripped of their police badges.

The court was about to send them to jail when a lawyer filed a power of attorney on behalf of the policemen, submitted their apology and requested the court to release them.

Subsequently, the court ordered their release on personal bond of Rs50,000 each.

The court also prepared a complaint against SI Abro and ASI Jaffery under Section 211 (false charge of offence made with intent to injure) of the Pakistan Penal Code and sent it to another court for trial.

‘TTP militant’ remanded

The administrative judge of the antiterrorism courts of Karachi on Monday remanded a suspected militant in police custody in a number of cases, including bomb blasts at the Abdullah Shah Ghazishrine and Seaview.

The crime investigation department (CID) arrested Mohammad Dawood alias Waleed alias Ishaq, stated to be associated with the banned Tehrik-iTaliban Pakistan, on Jan 14 within the remit of the Mochko police station after a shootout.

The police produced the suspect before the administrative judge, Justice Faisal Arab of the Sindh High Court, on Monday and sought his remand. The court handed over the suspect to the police on a 14-day physical remand and directed the investigation officers to produce him on the next hearing.

The CID also claimed to have seized arms and explosive substance from the suspect and alleged that he was involved in several attacks, including the Oct 2010 suicide bombing on the Abdullah Shah Ghazi shrine that had left eight people dead and another blast near Seaview in November last year.