The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday ordered a judicial inquiry into the alleged police encounter in Sahiwal and sought its report within 30 days.
A two member bench headed by Chief Justice Sardar Muhammad Shamim took up the case. Joint Investigation Team (JIT) head Aijaz Shah, heirs of the victims and their lawyers appeared before the court.
As the hearing started, Shah presented a progress report on the incident and informed the court that statements of seven eyewitnesses have been recorded. To this, the bench sought an explanation about the list of witnesses provided by the court in the case. The chief justice remarked that the JIT has not bothered to record statements of the eyewitnesses mentioned by the high court. “Is this the way to obey court orders?” he asked in anger.
“The way you are working on the case is disappointing,” Justice Sadaqat Ali told the JIT head. After receiving ‘unsatisfactory’ responses of Aijaz Shah into the probe, Chief Justice Shamim directed the sessions judge in Sahiwal to appoint a magistrate for the inquiry and ensure its report within 30 days.
Later, the hearing of the case was adjourned until February 18.
On January 19, CTD officials had killed four people, including a couple and their teenage daughter, in an alleged encounter in Sahiwal, triggering a national outcry that prompted the government to take the security officials into custody and order an investigation into the incident.
The CTD officials had claimed that the ‘terrorists’ were killed in an intelligence-based operation (IBO). They also claimed of confiscating explosives and weapons from the car, adding that police was investigating the matter as part of an operation against terrorists in Faisalabad on January 16.
Published in Daily Times, February 15th 2019.
