After FIA, IHC tears apart bogus ‘Save Shafqat’ campaign

ISLAMABAD: After the FIA inquiry, on Monday the Islamabad High Court also tore into pieces the dollar-driven NGOs’ baseless “Save Shafqat Hussain” campaign besides exposing how shamelessly the country’s criminal justice system has been targeted without verifying the facts of the case and on the basis of fake documents.
Dismissing the petition demanding constitution of a judicial commission to ascertain the age of Shafqat Hussain, who after killing a seven year body in 2004 had also demanded ransom from the child’s parents, the IHC judgment authored by Justice Athar Minallah noted, “Such litigation, besides being not maintainable, falls within the realm of being frivolous. It is tantamount to abuse of the process of the Court.”
Issuing a charge sheet against the campaigners of the “Save Shafqat” drama, Justice Minallah wrote, “Most importantly, such petitions and undeserved hype, without first verifying the facts and examining the record, is likely to be seen as being aimed at eroding public confidence in the criminal justice system. In the circumstances if proceedings, which have attained finality, are made subject to reassessment, the role of the judicial system, the effectiveness of criminal justice system will be undermined and eroded inevitably leading to chaos in society.”
The FIA in its inquiry report had also found this campaign as an effort to target the criminal justice system of Pakistan and thus had recommended to the Interior Ministry to initiate criminal proceedings against those who had masterminded and executed this campaign.
As against the campaigners all out propaganda to create serious doubts about the credibility of Pakistan’s criminal justice system, the IHC judgment said, “The trial record shows that besides his (Shafqat Hussain) confessional statement before a Judicial Magistrate, the prosecution had established its case beyond a reasonable doubt. The evidence was far more than the confessional statement. The well reasoned exhaustive judgement of the trial court is sufficient to place a heavy burden on the petitioner to make out at least an arguable case for consideration of the relief sought.”
Referring to the NGOs-fed international media’s propaganda of showing Sahfqat a juvenile, Justice Minallah noted, “The copies of the articles published in the foreign press contain assertions which have no basis at all, rather they are factually incorrect in the light of the record of the trial proceedings, and the arguments advanced or record produced on behalf of the petitioner.”
Justice Minallah added, “The correspondence between the Executive Director of Justice Project Pakistan, representing the petitioner, and various officials of the Federal Government and its agencies, does not disclose any material which would show that any of the fundamental right of the petitioner has been violated. Nothing has been placedbefore this Court which would indicate miscarriage of justice or a need for a probe.”
He maintained, “Conjectures, surmises, unsubstantiated assertions, assumptions without any cogent or material record, cannot vest jurisdiction in this Court to exercise its powers under Article 199 of the Constitution. “Some of the “Save Shafqat” campaigners had approached the IHC after the FIA inquiry committee, constituted to ascertain the fact regarding age of prisoner Shafqat Hussain, had recommend that criminal action should be initiated against all those who had conceived, actualised, facilitated and used bogus “birth certificate” as a legal document to misguide and misrepresent the actual facts of the case.
The FIA committee suggested, “Given the law of the land and the facts of the case which were unraveled during the course of the inquiry, the committee feels it obligatory to recommend that the single piece of “evidence” which was used to vilify and defame the justice system in Pakistan, and which has since been declared fake by the issuing authority, must be looked into more deeply.”
According to the FIA report an impression was created by the campaigners as if there was no margin or space in Pakistan’s penal system for treating juveniles as per their rights and the obligations of their age.