LAHORE:
An additional district and session judge (AD&SJ) granted post arrest bail to a woman who claimed she had been abducted by police officials for ransom. The police officials, however, claimed that she was a drug peddler.
Complainant, Uzma Bibi, told the court that police officials had abducted her and had demanded 0.5 million as ransom. She produced a CD which she said contained an audio recording of the bargaining that had taken place between the officials and her son over the ransom.
She said Khurram and Ilyas, along with five others, had abducted her on April 20, 2011. She said that the men had called her son, Mohsin Ali, and demanded Rs0.5 million for her release. On finding out that her son was unable to come up with that amount, they had bargained with him and reduced the amount to Rs1,30,000.
Uzma Bibi said that when the men found out that her son was unable to even put together the reduced amount they threatened to kill her. She told the court that her kidnappers told her son to give the money to their colleagues, Arshad Topa and Hanifa Pawayan Wala, when her son told them that he had arranged some money.
Her son, she said, filed an application on April 22 before the Mozang SHO for registration of an FIR against the men but the SHO would not entertain him.
Her son moved the court and filed a petition under Section 22A (6) of the Criminal Procedure Code asking the court to direct the SHO to register the FIR.
Uzma Bibi said in response SI Imdad Ali filed an FIR against her on April 25 and the officials, Khurram Shahzad, Muhammad Ilyas, Khalid Mehmood, Shahnaz Kausar and Saira Pervaiz along with the Ghazi Abad SHO colluded in the filing of the FIR.
She told the court that in the FIR the police say that they had conducted a raid and recovered 500 g of charas from her possession and 2,500 g from another woman, Gogi.
Uzma Bibi’s lawyer, Rai Khalid Pervez Waseem, told the court that his client was innocent and had nothing to do with the crime. He said the police had implicated his client to save their own skin.
He said that the police officials had produced an incomplete record in another AD&SJ’s court. The police, then, produced the record till April 29.
The judge after hearing the CD provided by the complainant granted her post arrest bail. Advocate Waseem told The Express Tribune that the judge also issued a show cause notice to the investigation officer regarding completion on back dates in the record, fixing July 19 as the next date of hearing.
Speaking with The Express Tribune, Uzma Bibi said the abductors had tied one of her legs with a chain and kept her in a room for six days. She said initially, she was unaware that she had been abducted by police officials but realised this when she found out that a fake FIR had been registered against her. She said that the police officials also gave threatened her saying that they would kill her if she disclosed that that they had been involved in her abduction.
Published in The Express Tribune, May 17th, 2011.
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