LAHORE :An ordeal of an ill-fated woman finally came to an end after spending 19 years in jail as the Lahore High Court (LHC) set aside her life imprisonment in a murder case of her husband and ordered her immediate release.
Rani Bibi was arrested in 1998 at the age of 24 in the murder case of her husband and was awarded life imprisonment by additional sessions judge, Jhang in 2001. As she belonged to a poor section of society and was unable to afford the heavy fee of lawyer, asked the jail authorities to file her jail appeal but the same was not preferred for 16 years. Finally her appeal was filed in 2015 and decided on October 24, 2017. Justice Ch Abdul Aziz ordered acquittal of the lady of the charges and ordered to release her from jail. The court in its written order observed, “the appellant (Rani Bibi) was arrested in the instant case on 02.09.1998 as a young lady of 24-years of age and has spent approximately two decades in the judicial custody. Despite the case to her extent being of no admissible evidence, she spent all the springs of her life in the darkness of the prison. Since the appellant and her co-convicts were from the poor segment of our society, hence, were not in a position to afford the luxury of a defence counsel from their own resources.
Resultantly, they challenged the judgment of conviction through jail appeals in the year 2001. However, unfortunately, it transpired in the year 2014 that no appeal was preferred on behalf of the appellant, consequently, the instant appeal was filed in the year 2015.” The court also showed its helplessness in awarding compensation to the lady whose life’s 19 years were wasted due to slackness of our judicial as well as jail system.
The court further observed, “the ill-fated lady was left to anguish in the jail solely due to lackluster attitude of the jail authorities. The miseries of the appellant though have come to an end after about 18 years, yet this court feels helpless in compensating her but feel persuaded to issue direction to the Inspector General of Prisons, Punjab, Lahore to make sure that in future the youth of the persons like appellant is not rusted in the darkness of barracks of the jail due to the mistake of some official of Prison Department. The court also sent the copy of the judgment to IGP (Prisons), hoping that he would draw a proper future strategy to save some other person from undergoing such agony.
Justice Aziz went on to say in the judgment, “a heavy duty is cast upon the Presiding Officer of a court at the time of recording of the evidence. He is legally obliged to bring on record, only the evidence which is legally admissible. He must be at his toes to discard evidence, which is inadmissible in nature. Likewise, if any objection is raised either by the defence or by the prosecution, regarding the admissibility of any evidence, the learned Presiding Officer of the court is to decide the fate of such an objection there and then. It is not appreciable on his part to dispense with his order regarding such an objection until the final pronouncement of the judgment.
Such an approach on one hand is likely to frustrate the very wisdom and intent of the legislatures, whereby it is desired that an inadmissible piece of evidence should not be made part of the record and on the other hand reflects adversely about the legal acumen of the court.
It will not be out of place to mention that the very purpose of creation of judicial system is to administer justice and to achieve such object, the courts have to strive hard with full vigilance and application of judicious mind. Any slackness on the part of the court is likely to damage the repute of judicature and can result into loss of faith in the judicial system by the litigants. Such a purpose can only be achieved, if the proceedings before the courts are conducted strictly in accordance with the law of the land. The court concluded that the evidence of last seen, the prosecution has not been able to place on record any other circumstance which may connect the appellant even remotely with the commission of crime. As per the case of the prosecution, the woman's husband left his house in the company of appellant and co-convicts and went to their house situated in Pindi Bhattian. However, the body was recovered not from Pindi Bhattain but from the house of none other than the deceased himself. This aspect of the case casts doubt regarding the correctness of the claim of complainant Sher Muhammad and renders them unworthy of any credence.