PHC seeks reply from federal, provincial govts in 20 days

Petition for information on APS carnage

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday issued notice to both the federal and provincial governments to submit reply within 20 days in a writ petition seeking the court orders for making all the information on the Army Public School (APS) carnage public.

A two-member bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Muhammad Younas Thaheem issued the notice.It was issued in a writ petition by a lawyer, Ajun Khan, father of student Asfand Khan, who was killed during the attack on the Army Public School Peshawar on December 16, 2014.

During hearing, dozens of lawyers appeared along with the petitioner lawyer in the case. A senior lawyer Naveed Akhtar argued the case for the petitioner lawyer.Mothers of the APS victims and civil society network women members alsoattended the court proceedings in the case.

The senior lawyer said on August 28, 2014, the National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta) had through a letter informed the provincial government and additional chief secretary of Fata that a commander of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan in collaboration with others had made a plan to carry out terrorist activities against APS and other educational institutions run by the Pakistan Army to kill the maximum number of children of the army officers and soldiers to avenge the killing of their accomplices. He said necessary action to counter the threat was not taken by the administration.

He said whether that was an act of criminal negligence or some secret mission or conspiracy that such a sensitive information or intelligence report was ignored. This, he added, resulted into the unforgettable incident of terrorist attack on the APS on December 16, 2014, which left 144 students and some staff members martyred.

The lawyer said petitioner and his wife had lost their sleep and peace of mind since that incident and such happening kept them pushing to look into the facts as to why their institutions failed to perform own duties to protect the life of citizens.

The petitioner stated that since the terrorist attack on the APS, he and families of other victims had been asking the respondents to inform them why the prior information of the attack was not communicated to them and what action had been taken by them to determine and fix the responsibility on the officials concerned.

He claimed he had himself raised the questions before the president of Pakistan, chairman of the Senate Defence Committee Mushahid Hussain and the KP chief minister besides others, but got no answer showing as if everybody wanted these questions to go away.

The petitioner prayed the court to accept his petition and direct the respondents to answer questions raised by him and release all information and actions on APS attack till date.Also, a total of 23 mothers of the APS martyrs including Shazia Abid, mother of Rafique Raza Bangash, Shagufta Tariq, mother of Shamail Tariq and Nangyal Tariq, Raheela Farhad, mother of Muhammad Furqan Haider, and others filed an application in the high court to seek impleadment in the writ petition.

Meanwhile, the PHC on Tuesday issued a notice to own registrar in a writ petition challenging appointment of 25 additional sessions judges. A two-member bench comprising Justice Irshad Qaiser and Justice Syed Afsar Shah issued the notice to the PHC registrar in the petition, asking him to submit reply before the next hearing.

Two lawyers including Syed Sibghatullah and Mian Hikmatullah had challenged the appointment of additional sessions’ judges in the high court. The PHC had recently appointed 25 additional sessions judges after meeting the required legal process.