Teenaged hoax caller granted bail

Published October 11, 2008

RAWALPINDI, Oct 10: A civil judge here on Friday granted bail to a teenager arrested on the charge of making hoax calls to the rescuers.

Civil Judge Tahir Khan Niazi directed the father of Shaheer Sikander to submit a surety bond of Rs10,000 for the bail, adding he could not put the future of a class-IX student by sending him to jail.

Sikander, whose father is an engineer and mother a schoolteacher, was accused of making calls to the rescuers saying bombs had been planted in two schools. The Civil Lines police traced him through the cellphone he had used to make the calls and sought his five days’ physical remand.

Meanwhile, ATC-II Judge Sakhi Mohammad Kahut extended the physical remand of a man arrested for making threatening calls to Rescue 1122 for five days. The Sadiqabad police arrested Abdul Wali after tracing him through the cellphone on October 8 for making calls threatening to carry out suicide bombing in Rawalpindi.

The ATC, separately, directed the Wah police to paste posters about two men allegedly involved in the suicide attacks outside Pakistan Ordnance Factories on August 21 and submit a report within a month.

Police had earlier obtained the arrest warrants of Daroza Khan and Mohammad Bilal Shah for their alleged role in the suicide attacks that killed over 70 people. However, they failed to arrest the accused and prayed the court to declare them proclaimed offenders. Irfan Saeed, another civil judge, remanded a man arrested for his suspected activities at Benazir Bhutto Airport in the custody of Airport police for three days. The Airport Security Force (ASF) arrested Zahid Hussian when he was going towards the domestic departure lounge wearing a veil and jiggers.