PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Thursday disposed of a writ petition filed by an imprisoned MPA-elect Baldev Kumar with the direction to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly speaker to issue his production order so that he could take oath of his office.

The bench comprising Justice Ikramullah Khan and Justice Mohammad Ghazanfar Khan observed that under the relevant rules the speaker had the powers to issue order for the production of a detained MPA.

Baldev Kumar was arrested in 2016 in connection with the killing of adviser to chief minister, Sardar Soran Singh.

The respondents in the petition are speaker of the provincial assembly; secretary of the provincial assembly; Election Commission of Pakistan; provincial election commissioner; and provincial government through law secretary.

Petitioner claims he was implicated in Sardar Soran Singh murder case

A bench of the high court had earlier in November 2017 rejected an identical petition of Mr Kumar with the observation that he had so far not given any application to the speaker for issuing his production order and he should first avail that opportunity.

In that petition, Speaker Asad Qaisar had told the court that neither the petitioner nor his parliamentary party had approached him for issuance of his production order.

Advocate Mohib Jan Salarzai appeared for the petitioner and stated that his client was a leader of PTI and belonged to minority Hindu community.

He said that during the 2013 general elections, Sardar Soran Singh was elected MPA on the seat reserved for minorities, and was also appointed adviser to the chief minister.

Mr Salarzai stated that Sardar Soran Singh was killed on April 22, 2016, with the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan militant outfit accepting responsibility for the killing.

The lawyer claimed that being an untraced case, the local police instead of making efforts to arrest the real culprits, implicated his client and arrested him in the case.

He stated that being on serial No 2 on the priority list of candidates submitted by the ruling PTI for seats reserved for minorities, the petitioner was declared returned candidate on the said vacant seat by the Election Commission of Pakistan.

The counsel stated that in line with the earlier judgment of the high court in the earlier petition filed by Mr Kumar, he had submitted several applications to the speaker requesting that his production order should be issued but in vain.

An additional advocate general informed the court that the petitioner had not taken oath, therefore, he was not a member of the provincial assembly for which under Rule 65A of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly Procedure and Conduct of Business Rules, 1988, the speaker was empowered to issue his production order.

He contended that Buner superintendent of police (investigation) had sent a letter to the provincial election commissioner, ECP, wherein he had informed that the petitioner Baldev Kumar had been arrested in connection with the murder of Sardar Soran Singh and he was the principal accused in the instant case.

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2018