Second thoughts: LHC withdraws criticism of IG over kidnapping case

Judge tells top cop criticism was meant to motivate, not offend.

LAHORE:

Justice Muhammad Khalid Mehmood Khan of the Lahore High Court on Friday accepted a petition moved by the inspector general of Punjab Police for critical comments made by the judge to be expunged from his service record.

The IG asked for his record to be cleared as the kidnapping case over which he was criticised had been solved and shown not to be an abduction but an elopement.

Justice Khan had accused IG Javed Iqbal of neglect in looking for the girl who had allegedly been abducted six years ago. The IG had told the judge that the search for the girl was difficult because the National Database and Registration Authority had no record of her.

The judge had reprimanded the IG for making lame excuses and selective enforcement, saying the police would have made a much greater effort at finding the girl if she had been an officer’s daughter. Justice Khan had been hearing a petition from Okara resident Rehmat Bibi for the recovery of her daughter Kaneez. It later emerged that the girl had eloped and had been living with her husband in Rawalpindi the whole time. Disposing of the petition on Friday, Justice Khan said he had criticised the IG not to hurt him personally, but to “make you expedite your efforts for the recovery of the girl”.

Hafiz Saeed’s anti-drone plea adjourned

The Lahore High Court has adjourned till October 7 a petition by Jamaatud Dawa chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed seeking the implementation of a parliamentary resolution against US drone strikes in Pakistan.

A deputy attorney general, representing the federal government, said on Friday that the courts could not interfere in policy matters. The petitioner’s counsel, AK Dogar, disagreed and sought time to file a rejoinder. The court allowed him till October 7.

The petition asks the court to declare that the drone strikes violate international law and the fundamental rights of Pakistani citizens, and that the government has acted against the will of its people by failing to enforce a resolution passed by the National Assembly on May 14. It asks the court to make public documents concerning all matters of public concern, particularly “secret deals with the US”.

Advocate Dogar has also asked the court to force the president, prime minister and all state functionaries to follow the example of the Holy Prophet (pbuh) and vacate their palatial official residences for small houses “like other common Muslims to get rid of the foreign debt”.

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