KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Thursday dismissed the petition challenging the recent appointment of the inspector general of prisons, Sindh, as the petitioner stated that he did not want to press the case.

Former IG prisons Muzaffar Alam Siddiqui petitioned the SHC and contended that he was appointed IG prisons in November last year after the removal of Nusrat Hussain Mangan from the post since he was facing corruption inquiries initiated by the National Accountability Bureau.

However, the petitioner further submitted that Mr Mangan was “mala fidely” appointed again as IG prisons on June 18 and he was directed to report to the home department.

The petitioner impleaded the chief secretary of Sindh, the home secretary and the incumbent IG prisons as respondents.

In the last hearing, the court had issued pre-admission notices to the respondents for July 4 and directed the lawyer for the petitioner to satisfy it about the maintainability of the petition at the next hearing.

However, when the petition came up for hearing before a two-judge bench headed by Justice Naimatullah Phulpoto on Thursday, the lawyer for the petitioner informed the bench that on the instruction of his client, he was not pressing the petition. “The counsel for petitioner, on the instruction of his client, does not press the instant petition, the same is dismissed as not pressed”, the bench ruled.

The former IG prisons in his petition contented that Mr Mangan was junior to the petitioner as the former was appointed as deputy jailer superintendent (BS 16) in November 1986 while the petitioner was appointed in March 1987 as jail superintendent (BS 17).

However, he argued that the chief secretary and the home secretary had replaced the petitioner with Mr Mangan “mala fidely” subjecting the petitioner to discrimination and political victimisation through a notification issued on June 18.

The petitioner further submitted that he was appointed as IG prisons in November last year after NAB initiated inquires against his predecessor and issued him call-up notices.

He argued that the post of the IG prisons was upgraded from BS 20 to BS 21 in 2010, but in 2013 it was again downgraded to BS 20, adding that in March the petitioner wrote a letter to the home secretary for reviving the post to BS 21 by withdrawing the notification, but instead he was transferred.

Alleged facilitators remanded

The administrative judge of the antiterrorism courts on Thursday remanded three suspects, including a woman, in police custody in explosives and illicit weapons cases.

Police produced Rashid Hussain Ansari, Siraj-ul-Haq and Sakina Naz before the court and contented that they were facilitators of outlawed Lashkar-i-Jhangvi’s Mumtaz alias Firoun, who along with another undertrial prisoner had managed to escape from the judicial complex of the Karachi central prison in June 2017.

The police further asserted that two hand grenades and two pistols were found in the possession of the suspects, adding that the seized explosives and weapons were being supplied to Mumtaz.

They further contended before the court that the female suspect admitted during questioning that she used to travel with the male suspects in order to avoid police checking.

The investigating officer said that the suspects were arrested in a Garden locality on June 3 and sought the custody of the suspects for 14 days to find their criminal record and arrest Mumtaz and others.

The administrative judge granted four-day physical remand of the suspects and directed the IO to produce them again on July 8.

The court also asked the IO to interrogate the female suspect at the women police station.

Published in Dawn, July 5th, 2019