It’s not judges’ domain to do govt job: SC

Quetta bombing case

Counsel says report shouldn’t have been minister-specific

ISLAMABAD: Hearing the Quetta bombing case, Supreme Court Judge Justice Amir Hani Muslim on Monday said it was not within the judges’ domain to do the job of the executive.

Justice Amir Hani heads the three-member bench hearing the case. Around 70 people, mostly lawyers, were killed and over 80 injured in the Quetta bombing on August 8 last year.Justice Hani said it was not the commission’s job to investigate the case but despite that it performed functions which were supposed to be done by the provincial and the federal government departments.

The judge said there was no proper training of investigation officers whereas they were dishonest and incompetent.Makhdoom Ali Khan, counsel for the Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, told the court that the observations made in the Quetta Carnage Commission report shouldn’t have been minister-specific. He contended that if the observations had been made against the ministry, then it would have been a different thing.

Regarding Maulana Muhammad Ahmad Ludhianvi’s meeting with Chaudhry Nisar Ali, he said the questionwas not who met with whom. He said the minister met a delegation of Defence of Pakistan, which was not a proscribed organisation. He said the minister did not know that Maulana Ludhianvi was also part of the delegation.

Makhdoom Ali Khan informed the court that he had no objection to the authority of the commission but the observation. On December 15, 2016, the commission, headed by the SC judge Justice Qazi Faiz Isa, submitted its report to the Supreme Court.

The court constituted an inquiry commission on the terrorist attack on October 6, 2016.The commission, in its findings, observed that the interior minister had displayed little sense of ministerial responsibility, as he called just one meeting of the Executive Committee of the Nacta in over three and a half years and violated the decisions of the Executive Committee of Nacta.

The commission further observed that the interior minister met the head of a proscribed organization, widely reported in the media with his photograph, but still denied doing so, accepted the demands of the proscribed organisation regarding CNICs, inexplicably delayed proscribing terrorist organisations, and not proscribed a well-known terrorist organisation.

Justice Amir Hani Muslim observed that according to the commission report, three months’ delay was caused in responding to the inquiry in the matter, adding under the SOP of the ministry, the task should have been done in 10 days.

Makhdoom Ali Khan said he had no objection to the jurisdiction of the commission but the adverse remarks made against his client should be expunged, as the apex court had done so in a series of cases.The court accepted Makhdoom Ali Khan’s plea to examine the intelligence agencies’ classified report.

The court permitted Makhdoom Ali Khan to examine the privileged and confidential documents in the matter, but directed him to avoid making copies of the record.Earlier, representing the Balochistan High Court Bar Association, Hamid Khan, Advocate, said the government still had not compensated the lawyers’ heirs.

Justice Amir Hani advised him to settle the matter outside the court and sit with the advocate general and chief secretary Balochistan.AG Balochistan Amanullah Kanrani told the court that compensation had been provided to the legal heirs of eight lawyers. He said an endowment fund of Rs250 million had been established for education of the deceased lawyers’ children.

Meanwhile, the court directed Hamid Khan to submit a reply to the objection of the interior minister raised against the commission’s report in the matter in the next 12 days. The ministry was also directed to submit a reply in the matter of evidence.

The court also summoned Secretary Communication and Works Rehmatullah Zaheri, Secretary Health Umer Baloch and Secretary Public Health Sheikh Nawaz who were granted a stay against notifications of their termination from service in the pursuance of the commission report.

Justice Amir Hani Muslim observed under which law the Federal Service Tribunal granted stay to Rehmatullah Zehri and to the rest of two secretaries by the High Court when the apex court had ruled in 2013 in a case that services tribunal and high court had no jurisdiction over the issues related to cadre posts.

The bench directed the advocate general, Balochistan, to inform the chief secretary to appoint eligible officials against the vacant slots observing the court would have initiated contempt proceedings against the three officials.