LAHORE: A larger bench of the Lahore High Court on Tuesday adjourned to September 15 (today) the proceedings in petitions against the formation of a new Joint Investigation Team (JIT) to probe afresh into the Model Town killings incident and announced to hear the petitions on daily basis.
Chief Justice Muhammad Ameer Bhatti, Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan, Justice Aalia Neelum, Justice Syed Shahbaz Ali Rizvi, Justice Sardar Ahmad Naeem, Justice Sardar Muhammad Sarfraz Dogar and Justice Tariq Saleem Sheikh are the members of the bench.
Earlier, Chief Justice observed that the bench would hear the petitions afresh as he was not a part of the bench previously seized with the matter. The bench initially asked Barrister Ali Zafar to start his arguments on the point of the maintainability of the petitions. However, the bench later decided to hear arguments of Advocate Azam Nazir Tarar, as he requested the bench to hear the case on a daily basis for three days as he was scheduled to visit Moscow as an election observer on September 17.
To different queries of the bench's members, Tarar said the affectees of the incident had not joined the proceedings before the first JIT made by the police. He said the trial proceedings in the state FIR of the incident came to halt after the Pakistan Awami Party (PAT) filed a private complaint before the trial court. He said the petitioners were indicted in the private complaint on April 12, 2018 and 86 witnesses had testified so far.
The counsel said the application filed by Bisma Amjad, daughter of a deceased woman, before the Supreme Court had no prayer for the formation of a new JIT. However, he said, the government undertook before the court to constitute a new JIT, which was notified on Jan 3, 2019.
He argued that the criminal law and the anti-terrorism had no provision for fresh investigation of an incident. The bench rose when Tarar was still submitting his arguments.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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