PHC summons senior officials in missing person case

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Friday issued notices to the chief secretary, inspector general of police and additional chief secretary Home on a habeas corpus petition after a citizen was picked up from outside the Central Prison Peshawar after being released on bail.

A single PHC bench of Chief Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim said that under what law the citizen was taken into custody after the high court granted him bail. The chief justice said that it was an unconstitutional act and the time had come to stop the intentional violation of the court orders. The petition was filed on behalf of a citizen Shakirullah through his lawyer Suhail Akhtar Advocate.

The lawyer told the court that the PHC had granted bail to Shakirullah on April 18 and he was subsequently released from the Central Prison Peshawar on April 25. However, the officials of the law-enforcement agencies picked him up from outside the prison and he had been missing since then. The court asked under what law the citizen was re-arrested after he was granted bail. In its written order, the court said that it had been established in the Asad Qaiser versus the provincial government case that a person once granted bail could not be re-arrested.The court ordered the chief secretary, inspector general of police and additional chief secretary Home to appear in person and adjourned the hearing till May 27.