Murree road blast: After embarrassing turf war, police arrest ‘suspect’

Raiding party was temporarily detained for not informing local police.

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad police have arrested one suspect for owning the SIM card used in a roadside explosion that occurred near Malpur village in June. The low intensity roadside blast on Murree Road near Malpur village injured three people on June 12.

An Islamabad police raiding party, in plain clothes, approached the suspect’s house in the area of union council Serishta Nashaib, 16 kilometres from Layyah, without prompting the local Kot Sultan police and arrested Khadim Hussain on Friday at 2pm.

Khadim’s relatives and other locals, believing Hussain was being kidnapped, immediately called the police emergency line 1215, Rescue 1122 and the Kot Sultan police. They started protesting soon after. The calls prompted the Layyah police to set up pickets on all entry and exit points of the district.

They managed to interrupt the raiding police party near Fatehpur police picket, some 40 kilometres from Layyah and seven kilometres from Serishta Nashaib, after the suspect’s relatives lodged a complaint with the local police.

Sources familiar with the matter said that a team member first introduced himself as an ISI official, and later claimed that the suspect was a member of terrorist cell, but the DPO had already told his subordinates to stop them from leaving Layyah with Hussain because they had not followed proper legal formalities or revealed their actual identities.

Sources added that despite pressure, the DPO rescued Khadim Hussain without the involvement of the courts.

Later, a large number of people reached Kot Sultan Police Station and to avoid any untoward incident, police shifted Hussain and the raiding party members to Layyah.

On Saturday, a senior police officer reached Layyah along with records of the original FIR registered at Sectariat Police Station. The police official appeared before the court of Allaqa Magistrate Allah Yar and presented evidence against the suspect.

The court handed Hussain over to Islamabad Police on one-day transit remand. On Sunday Islamabad police obtained a one-day physical remand and started investigations.

Islamabad ASP Shakir Ahmed Shah, Secretariat SHO Asad Altaf and Investigation Officer Farooq Niazi, were reluctant to further elaborate on the case, citing the sensitivity of the investigation.

Faqeer Ghulam Akbar, Hussain’s uncle, said Hussain, 36, is a father of four who suffers from tuberculosis and has never visited Islamabad.

His weight has fallen to 40 kg and he has a rural background; he tills his ancestral 15-odd acres in the village. Akbar blamed local resident Zafar Iqbal, whose brother is employed by an intelligence agency, for the entire episode.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 18^th, 2011.