Magistrate slams police for false accusations

Accused released, says he is a target of personal vendetta.

LAHORE:

A magistrate on Monday expelled from his courtroom two policemen seeking judicial remand for a dacoity suspect and told them off for making false accusations against him, in a case illustrating the tactics used by police to get around legal requirements.

Umair Naseer, who had been in police custody since early on Friday, told The Express Tribune that he had been victimised by the police at the behest of a Sub Inspector Ramazan Dogar, who had a personal vendetta against him.

Judicial Magistrate Imran Tariq ordered Naseer’s release after he read the case record and it showed that his arrest had been recorded in the daily diary with a pencil, an indication that the police were trying to forge the record.

“I will show you how innocent people are implicated in false cases,” said the judge as he flung the case files at Sub Inspectors Muhammad Bashir and Muhammad Munir, who had presented Naseer in court seeking his judicial remand for an identity parade. He told the policemen to leave the room and stand outside, and ordered Naseer’s release.

Picked up at 1.30am

According to Naseer, the trouble began after he moved a petition against SI Dogar for harassment and raiding his home without cause. He said that the judge had directed the Factory Area SHO to record Naseer’s statement of complaint against the SI, but the SHO refused to register an FIR, saying he would not do so against a colleague.

At 1.30am on October 21, Naseer was picked up by the Crime Investigation Agency for alleged involvement in a dacoity whose FIR was registered at Burki police station.

His sister filed a petition in the court of Additional District and Sessions Judge Arif Hameed Sheikh later the same day saying the CIA had illegally detained Naseer as well as their aunt Shukria Bibi. A bailiff dispatched by the court found that no female constable had been deputed with Bibi, while her and Naseer’s arrests were written in pencil. Bibi was released and the judge ordered that Naseer be produced before the relevant magistrate.

Meanwhile, Naseer was produced in the Model Town Courts, then in the Cantonment Courts, where Judicial Magistrate Imran Yousaf remanded him in police custody for one day.

The next day he was presented before Judicial Magistrate Qaiser Imam, who, having read the bailiff’s report about the pencil entry, ordered his immediate release. The Shadman police officials who had brought Naseer to court undid his handcuffs in the room, but rearrested him outside as he was ‘wanted’ in three other cases. On Monday, Magistrate Tariq ordered his release from those cases as well.

Naseer said that he was innocent and had been implicated in various dacoity cases because he had moved the Sessions Court against SI Dogar.

He said that he had moved the petition as the SI had been harassing him for a few days and raided his house one night when he was not at home. “When Ramazan Dogar learned that I had approached the court, he contacted the CIA,” he said.

He did not say why he believed the SI had harassed him in the first place.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 25^th, 2011.