Alleged plot to assassinate LHC CJ: ‘Special Branch officials sought to create political rift’

Commission report says apparent objective of the officials was to malign the PPP.

ISLAMABAD: The three-member judicial commission that probed into the alleged plot to kill Chief Justice Lahore High Court Khwaja Mohammad Sharif, has revealed in its report that the apparent objective of the Special Branch report, authored by additional Inspector General, Colonel Ehsanur Rehman and his deputy Shahid Mahmood, was to malign and defame persons associated with the ruling party and the party itself.

This was done, the Commission said, to pitch the Punjab government of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) against the federal government of the Pakistan Peoples Party.

The Commission also questioned the move by the Special Branch Punjab to send one copy of the source report to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif when he was in Murree. The Commission wondered why the report was sent to Nawaz Sharif, who did not hold any official position in the Punjab government.

The judicial report, submitted before the government after completing its probe within two months, said that the fact that the PML-N and PPP were political rivals presented an opportunity to Colonel Ehasn “which he sought to exploit.” He was least concerned with the consequences which were likely to arise in the prevailing political atmosphere, the Commission observed.

The commission was headed by Chief Justice Balochistan Qazi Faez Isa with Justice Iqbal Hameedur Rehman and Justice Imtiaz Ali as its two members. The judicial commission has recommended strict action against the officers of the Punjab government after finding them part of a larger conspiracy to fabricate a report.

The judicial commission has also criticised Punjab government official Dr Tauqir Shah for deliberately leaking the bogus source report to the media, which, it said, under the circumstances was an extremely irresponsible thing to do.

The commission also noted that the report was prepared on August 2, 2010, and no action was taken on it despite the passage of 40 days and there remained no urgency on September 10 (the date when the report was released to a journalist of The News, Islamabad) to thwart the alleged attack, which was stated to be the reason for placing the report in the public domain.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 14^th, 2011.