Police in cover-up bid after shooting motorist dead

Four police commandos booked for murder but no arrests so far

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad Police on Thursday allegedly tried to cover up an incident in which their commandos apparently killed a sexagenarian man late on Wednesday evening while critically injuring another after a brief chase.

The officials involved reportedly disappeared after the incident as the cops involved were booked.

Syed Ijaz Shah and his friend, 60-year-old Syed Inayat Shah, had gone to a roadside eatery near the Rawal Dam Chowk on Wednesday evening to enjoy a meal together. Later, the two left in Ijaz’s Suzuki Mehran Car.



As they sped towards the nearby Margalla Town where Ijaz lived, they noticed a police van following them and flashing their lights at the car. Taking it for a signal to pull over, Ijaz parked his vehicle by the side of the road.

“As soon as I pulled over, they [police] opened fire at us,” Ijaz told The Express Tribune.

Inayat was shot by a machine gun in his right armpit and died on the spot while Ijaz received three to four machine gun bullets to his right leg.

The policemen left Inayat in the car and dragged Ijaz with them to a nearby Rescue 1122 kiosk. They handed over the injured man to the rescue workers, telling the paramedics to take Ijaz to the hospital and then disappeared without telling any official about what had happened.

Ijaz was shifted to the Polyclinic hospital where he received treatment for his wounded leg.

The authorities only found out about the shootout when a Rawal Town resident, who was an eyewitness to the incident, called the police. Residents said that regular police showed up at the scene around half an hour after the event and shifted Inayat’s body to the Polyclinic hospital.



Later on Wednesday night, a murder and an attempted murder case were registered against the four unidentified cops.

Police officials and witnesses at the eatery said that the policemen were having tea at the eatery when they heard a man shouting at the Mehran car speeding away.

“Perhaps the policemen thought that someone had stolen the car or something else and were fleeing. They followed the car for around two kilometres before the shootout,” said a police officer who requested anonymity since he was not authorised to speak to the media.

He added that the man who had screamed at the car later told policemen that Ijaz had owed him some money and had sped away perhaps in yet another bid to evade him.

However, senior police officials termed the incident an ‘encounter’ and claimed that officials had unleashed a volley after they were fired upon first and that it was this retaliatory firing which killed Inyat and injured Ijaz.

Islamabad Police Inspector General’s Spokesperson Ziaul Qamar claimed that the police had recovered a pistol from the car and three casings of bullets which were reportedly fired on the police patrol.

However, both Ijaz and eyewitnesses refuted this claim.

“I have never fired a bullet in my entire life,” Ijaz exclaimed from his hospital bed.

“The two men in the car, they did not offer any resistance. And no weapon was recovered from their car. The policemen drove away with the injured and left the body behind,” an eyewitness said.



Inspector Ahmed Kamal, who was tasked with investigating the case, said that he had yet to see the pistol or the bullet casings which the accused officials had found near the crime scene.

Moreover, he added that the direction in which the bullets were fired into the car suggest that two separate guns had rained bullets.

Later, Qamar claimed that two of the four officials involved in the incident, Javed and Jameel Wali, had been arrested but the investigation officer was unaware of the arrests.

“No official has been arrested yet, not at least to my knowledge,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 1^st, 2017.