Lawyer’s abduction case: Court summons IGP to appear today

Abbasi cited SHO Industrial Area, Islamabad IGP, DG of ISI, secretaries of defense, interior as respondents.

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday summoned IGP Tahir Alam Khan after police officials failed to produce a ‘missing’ member of the Islamabad District Bar Association (DBA) before the court despite repeated orders.

Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui observed that the failure [to recover the abducted lawyer] was a question mark on the police’s performance. He was hearing the case of lawyer Hammad Dadan, who along with two others, was allegedly picked up by armed personnel of an intelligence agency on June 20.

In his remarks, Justice Siddiqui said the failure to recover the lawyer was a slap on the face of the police, adding that instead of solving the issue the police was making it more complicated.

The remarks came in response to the police claim that Hammad’s phone had been traced to somewhere in Peshawar and they were trying to locate it through Geo-fencing — a feature in a software programme that uses the global positioning system.

The court termed the explanation ‘concocted stories’ and directed to produce the lawyer and issued notice to the IGP to appear in person before the court on Wednesday (today). In addition, the court directed the ministry of defence to depute an official for making correspondence between the police and the intelligence agency.

Mumtaz Anwar Abbasi had approached the IHC saying his son, Hammad, along with three of his friends identified as Abdullah Umar, Ammar Dadan, and Ahmad, went to Masjid Imam Abu Daud near the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences for Taraweeh prayers on June 20.

At around 11pm, the petitioner, through his counsel Mirza Shahzad Akbar, said he received a call from his son asking him to come help him as his car was hit by another vehicle from behind near a private school. Abbasi said when he reached the spot, Ahmad and residents of the area and a number of policemen present there informed him that Hammad, Ammar and Abdullah were taken away by armed men belonging to an intelligence agency.

Abbasi has cited SHO Industrial Area, Islamabad IGP, director-general of Inter-Services Intelligence and secretaries of defense and interior ministries as respondents.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 1^st, 2015.