Sarfaraz Shah case: ATC jurisdiction to try Rangers challenged

Defence counsel says the Rangers’ were only doing their ‘lawful’ duty.

KARACHI:

The Sarfaraz Shah murder trial hit yet another technical hitch, when the defence counsel moved four identical applications, separately, under section 23 of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) 1997, challenging the trial of the accused by the Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC).

The applications maintain that under the ATA, a special court of the ATC is bound to examine the material, facts and circumstances of a case and if found that the act does not constitute as that of terrorism, it shall transfer the same to a sessions court.

Referring to Shah’s murder case, the defence counsel contended that according to the facts and circumstances brought forward, it was in fact not an act of terrorism.

The act carried out by the Rangers’ personnel was not aimed at harassing any individual, group or cross section of the population, or to threaten any government functionary or anyone else, the counsel said.

The counsel also maintained that the accused officials were performing their “lawful” duty on the call of a person who had taken the deceased [Shah] into custody alleging him to be a robber.

He added that the Rangers’ officials asked Shah to surrender, but when he attempted to snatch the rifle from one of them, he was shot at which caused an injury to a “non-vital” part of his body.

The alleged offence is not covered under the ATA and thus, the trial must be transferred to an ordinary court of law, the defence counsel maintained.

The court, which was set to commence a formal trial and examine the first few prosecution witnesses on Thursday after the new development, ordered the issuance of a notice of the application to the special public prosecutor and fixed a hearing for the application for today [Friday].

In case the transfer plea is rejected, ATC-I will record statements of the prosecution witnesses today [Friday].

Published in The Express Tribune, July 1^st, 2011.