PHC orders Punjab home dept to produce record

Death of missing KP student

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday directed secretary Home Department, Punjab, to produce record and postmortem report of a missing person from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa who was allegedly killed in a police encounter in Punjab.

A two-member bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Muhammad Daud Khan made secretary Home Department, Punjab, as party in the case and directed him to submit record and postmortem report about the killing of a man in an alleged police encounter in Punjab.  

The directions were issued after the enforced disappearance case of the deceased, Khan Wahid, has been pending with the court for months.

Khalid Anwar, lawyer for Mohammad Ismail, informed the court that Khan Wahid was killed by the Punjab Police in a fake encounter in Raiwind after declaring him a member of the Al-Qaeda.

He said the Punjab Police were not giving the post-mortem report of the slain student to his family.The bench was hearing a habeas corpus petition filed last year by Mohammad Ismail, challenging the alleged illegal detention of his son Khan Wahid.

Mohammad Ismail said that his son Khan Wahid was a student of B.Com at a local college. His lawyer informed the bench that the Punjab Police on Mar 30, 2016, claimed that they had killed five terrorists affiliated with the Al-Qaeda.

According to them, a team of the Crime Investigation Agency raided a house in Raiwind. The Punjab Police had alleged that the cops came under fire by terrorists, who were killed when the police returned the fire.  They claimed the deceased were involved acts of subversion.

However, the lawyer said on May 5, 2015, a large number of law-enforcers raided the house of the petitioner in Afridi Garhi in Peshawar and took away the deceased.

The lawyer said the petitioner had filed the petition last year and had feared that his son might be killed in custody. He added that the apprehensions of the petitioner proved correct. The lawyer said his client had stated that hands of his son were tied when he was killed.

Deputy Attorney General Musarratullah Khan submitted a reply on behalf of the federal government, saying that the matter involved two provinces and the federal government had nothing to do with it.