Contempt plea filed in Fawad Chardhry case
A plea filed in the Lahore High Court has sought contempt proceedings against 16 police officials, including the inspectors general of Islamabad and Punjab, along with the interior secretary and additional secretary, over repeatedly flouting court orders for the production of PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry.
Petitioner Nabeel Shahzad, cousin of Fawad Chaudhry, contended in his petition filed through Advocate Azhar Siddique that a plea had been filed, seeking recovery of Chaudhry, upon which the LHC had issued repeated orders after short intervals to the officials, including the IGPs, but in vain. The petition came up for hearing at around 12:10pm on January 25 and the court directed the officials to ask the respondents to produce Chaudhry at 1:30pm. The order was conveyed to the respondents but the PTI leader was not produced, the petitioner contended.
When the matter was again take up after an interval, the same directive was given again to the respondents, but it was not implemented. The order was also aired by the social media and TV channels.
This time, directives were issued to the IGs of Islamabad and Punjab police to appear in person along with Chaudhry, but neither the IGP of Islamabad appeared nor Chaudhry was produced.
The petitioner contended that this act of the respondents was not only contemptuous but amounted to sabotaging the judicial system.
However, the petition was dismissed as Chaudhry had reached Islamabad because of the respondents' actions in defiance of the court orders, the petitioner claimed. He accused the respondents of committing contempt of the court.
He requested the court to initiate contempt proceedings Punjab IGP Dr Usman Anwar, Islamabad IGP Dr Akbar Nisar Khan, Deputy IG (Operation) Afzaal Kausar, Lahore Cantt Superintendent of Police (Operation) Raza Tanvir, Model Town SP (Operation) Hassan Javed, DSP Zulfiqar Butt, Shadman Police Station SHO Aslam Shafi, Kohsar Police Station Sub-Inspectors Adeel Ashraf and Muhammad Jameel, and others, including Interior Secretary Yousaf Naseem Khokhar and Additional Secretary Asad Islam.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 29th, 2023.