LHC to hear Sahiwal incident JIT case on Monday

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court division bench headed by Chief Justice Sardar Muhammad Shamim Khan would take up on Monday the petitions challenging the government-made Joint Investigation Team (JIT) on Sahiwal incident and to constitute a judicial commission instead.

Muhammad Jalil, brother of Khalil who was gunned down along with his wife and a teenage daughter in an ‘encounter’, challenged the formation of the JIT the other day while another identical public interest petition by a lawyer landed in the court on Friday, raising the number of the petitions on the issue to four.

All the petitioners mainly questioned the impartiality of the JIT made by the provincial government and doubted its capacity to hold the real culprits accountable. They submitted that formation of a judicial commission was critical due to non-seriousness of the government to provide justice to the victims.

The petitioners asked the court to set aside the JIT and order constitution of a judicial commission under Section 3 of Punjab Tribunals of Inquiry Ordinance 1969 or under Section 3 of Pakistan Commissions of Inquiry Act 2017 to dig out facts of the Sahiwal incident.