SHC returns home department’s request in Intizar murder case

CJ says judicial commission should be headed by the district and sessions judge concerned

KARACHI: Sindh High Court (SHC) Chief Justice Ahmed Ali M Sheikh returned the provincial home department's request to nominate a judicial officer to head the judicial commission set up to investigate the alleged extrajudicial killing of a teenager by the Anti-Car Lifting Cell's (ACLC) personnel in Karachi.

Judicial sources told The Express Tribune on Saturday that the home department had requested the top provincial judge to nominate a judicial officer to head the commission to investigate the killing of 19-year-old Intizar Ahmed.

Intizar was fatally shot by undercover ACLC officers on Khayaban-e-Ittehad in Karachi's Defence Housing Authority on January 13 after he reportedly failed to stop his vehicle at their signal.

The killing had caused hue and cry by civil rights activists on social media, sparking protest demonstrations to seek a judicial investigation into the extrajudicial killing and action against the ACLC personnel involved.



"In the light of Sections 22-A and 24 read with Section 22-B of the Pakistan Penal Code [PPC], the practice of judicial inquiries has become redundant," CJ Sheikh observed.

"The district and sessions judges concerned have been directed to take up the matter themselves or entrust the same to the additional district and sessions judges for exercising appropriate powers under Section 22-B(a) and, if necessary, under Section 22-A of PPC," read the written response to the home secretary.

In the national judicial policy devised in 2005, the district and session judges were delegated powers to conduct judicial inquiries on their own.

Returning the request, the high court advised the provincial home secretary to approach the concerned district and sessions judge for the purpose of a judicial inquiry into the alleged extrajudicial killing.