Indian convict to be given benefit of law, PHC told

Hamid Ansari had entered Pakistan on fake documents

PESHAWAR: The government has informed the Peshawar High Court that benefit of section 382-B of the Code of Criminal Procedure would be given to the convicted Indian national Hamid Nehal Ansari by a military court for entering Pakistan on fake documents.

The law officers including Deputy Attorney General Musarratullah Khan and Additional Advocate General Waqar Ahmad informed a division bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Muhammad Daud Khan that the Indian convict is entitled to the benefit of section 382-B.

However, the bench sought details from the provincial and federal governments regarding the arrest of the Indian national and his expected release from the prison before the next hearing.  The court also directed the government to provide required treatment to the said prisoner in the Peshawar Central Prison.

About shifting him from the death cell to the hospital or to an ordinary room, the law officers said he was kept there for security reasons as one prisoner had already attacked him in the prison. 

The Indian national, Hamid Nehal Ansari, had filed writ petition in the high court through his lawyer Qazi Muhammad Anwar, to seek benefit of section 382-B and his shifting to the Peshawar prison’s hospital or to an ordinary room from the death cell at the jail.

A military court on November 14, 2015 awarded three years rigorous imprisonment to him for entering Pakistan on fake documents.The prison authorities have confined him to a vacant death cell as one of the most protected prisoners.

During hearing, the petitioner’s lawyer Qazi Anwar requested the court to direct the prison authorities to extend the benefit of Section 382-B of the Code of Criminal Procedure to him from November 15, 2012 when he was taken into custody until his conviction. This includes the period he had spent in confinement, interrogation and investigation by the army.

He also requested that directive be issued to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to facilitate the visit of his mother Fauzia Ansari to Peshawar so that she could see him at the prison. He asked the court to direct the Kohat Police to hand over his passport and other articles he had in his possession at the time of arrest.

The law officers said that following request by the Indian high commissioner, the Interior Ministry had sent a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs asking it to issue visa to the mother of the convict. Qazi Muhammad Anwar also offered to host the convict’s mother in Peshawar so that she could meet him in the prison.

About the ordeal of the convict, the petition stated that Hamid Nehal Ansari was the holder of the Indian passport issued in Mumbai on July 7, 2011 and valid till July 6, 2021. It said he left India for Afghanistan on November 11, 2012 on a valid tourist visa.

According to the travel schedule, he was supposed to return home on November 15, 2012. However, it transpired from his emails that he left Jalalabad for Peshawar on November 12, 2012. It said that he succeeded to enter Pakistan using a fake identity card carrying the name of Hamza sent to him by his Facebook friends from Karak district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with whom he stayed for two days.

The petition said that on November 14, 2012 his host in Karak left him at a hotel in Kohat. It said that from the hotel as per the police report, the personnel of an intelligence agency took him into custody.

It said that for the safe recovery of her son, Fauzia Ansari filed a habeas corpus petition that was disposed of when the Ministry of Defence informed the court that he was in the custody of the army.