LAHORE: A justice of peace on Tuesday issued notices to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on a petition seeking registration of a case against the Crime Control Department (CCD) chief and other officials on charges of killing five close relatives in as many ‘encounters’ conducted the same day at different locations.
Zubaida Bibi, a resident of Bahawalpur, filed the petition.
Advocate Aftab Bajwa appeared before the judge on behalf of the petitioner, saying on the nights of Sept 25 and 26, 2025, a large group of police officials from the CCD raided the house of the woman.
He said the CCD personnel allegedly used force, harassed women, children and looted valuables, including gold jewellery and cash.
During this raid, the lawyer alleged that the police abducted the petitioner’s three sons Imran, Irfan and Adnan besides her son-in-law Hassan Jahangir. She said one Nazir Wali, a brother of Jahangir, who was already in the custody of the CCD, was sitting handcuffed in the police van at the time of the raid.
He alleged that the CCD officials killed all five arrested persons by staging as many ‘fake’ encounters on the night of Sept 29 in different cities.
The counsel claimed that the petitioner’s sons and son-in-law were taken to different locations including Chiniot, Faisalabad, Narowal and Hafizabad where they were killed in custody.
He said the police registered multiple FIRs under sections such as 302 (murder), 324 (attempted murder) and 353 (assault on public servant) to justify these killings as legitimate shootouts.
Advocate Bajwa alleged that these killings were carried out at the behest of private individuals who had personal enmity with the petitioner’s family.
He stated that an application was filed with the FIA for registration of a case under the Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention and Punishment) Act 2022 against CCD chief Sohail Zafar Chattha and SPs of the cities where the ‘fake’ encounters were conducted.
However, he said, the FIA had not registered a case on the application.
He asked the justice of peace to order the FIA to lodge an FIR against CCD officials and private suspects who allegedly orchestrated the killings.
The judge issued a notice to the FIA director for submission of a reply by Dec 22.
Published in Dawn, December 17th, 2025