SHC issues directives on disappearance cases

The court has ordered further effective measures for missing persons' recovery

KARACHI:

The Sindh High Court (SHC), hearing the petitions regarding citizens have gone missing from different areas of the city, has ordered the authorities to take effective measures to recover them.

The investigating officer (IO) submitted a report that Zafar Iqbal and Malik Rizwan were missing from Site Superhighway area.

Additionally, Dhani Bakhsh is missing from the Shah Latif Town area, Raisuddin from Landhi, and several other individuals are missing from different parts of Karachi.

Multiple meetings of Joint Investigation Team (JIT) and Provincial Task Force have been held to address the issue.

In one of these JIT meetings, it was confirmed that the individuals were victims of enforced disappearance, and a summary for compensation was approved.

Letters have been sent to detention centres, IGs, and other relevant authorities regarding the recovery efforts.

The court has ordered further effective measures for their recovery and mandated additional meetings of the JITs and Provincial Task Force. The court adjourned the hearing for four weeks.

Land dispute

The SHC heard a petition regarding the land dispute between Jinnah University for Women and Jinnah Boys College and ordered the chief secretary to form a committee to sort out the dispute between the two institutions.

The additional secretary of the college department informed the court that the land in question belongs to Jinnah Government College, which currently has 4,552 students and 68 teachers and staff members.

The petitioner's lawyer argued that the land actually belongs to a trust under which Jinnah University for Women operates and that the university has not been given possession of the 14 acres of the disputed land.

Following the arguments, the court directed the chief secretary to establish a committee, comprising officers from the KDA, Master Plan Authority, and College Education and the committee should be tasked with determining the legal status of the land and submit a report within one month.