Perween Rahman had named killer in interview before assassination, ATC told

Perween Rahman, the director of the Orangi Pilot Project (OPP), had named her suspected killer in an interview to a journalist two years before her assassination.

This was revealed in the latest supplementary charge sheet filed in an anti-terrorism court (ATC) by the fifth joint investigation team (JIT) formed on the orders of the Supreme Court to investigate the murder case.

Perween, who was a renowned urban planner and social activist, was murdered in a drive-by shooting on her car on the Banaras flyover a few minutes after she left office for home on March 13, 2013.

Five men, including Abdul Raheem Swati, his son Imran Swati, Ayaz Shamzai, Ahmed Khan and Amjad Hussain, have been charged with her murder by police. All of the accused are currently in jail in judicial custody.

The charge sheet quoted her interview to a journalist, Fahad Deshmukh, in which she had referred to Raheem as a “land grabber and extortionist”, claiming that he was trying to occupy land reserved for an OPP office.

The report stated that Deshmukh had verified the content of the said interview and also provided an audio clip of the same which was aired on the US-based international broadcaster, Public Radio International (PRI), in January 2012.

It added that the journalist told the investigators that he had met Perween in her office in Orangi Town in December 2011. His statement was recorded under the Section 161 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and made part of the prosecution record.

The JIT was constituted on the orders of the apex court after Perween’s sister Aquila Ismail had expressed her dissatisfaction at the Sindh police, requesting that the case be handed over to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

An FIA officer, Babar Bakht Qureshi, who headed the JIT, noted in the report that besides the available evidence, the investigators had looked into the case through the angle of the alleged involvement of the water and land mafia in the murder.

The JIT mentioned in the report that they had quizzed politicians, journalists and land developers during the investigations and in the light of their findings, they observed that Perween was killed by Raheem and his accomplices. The ATC-VII judge, after accepting the charge sheet, directed his office to keep all the five JIT reports in safe custody and fixed the matter for further proceedings on March 20.