PESHAWAR:
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday summoned two police officials for failing to provide confessional statements of two accused in a triple-murder case.
PHC Chief Justice (CJ) Dost Muhammad Khan gave the orders while hearing the bail plea of Ehtisham, a man accused of murdering his wife, Nargis, and two children, Alisha and Shayan, for ‘honour’ in April last year.
The case was taken up a year later after the victim’s family filed an FIR with the Par Hoti Police Station on April 12, accusing Iqbal, Ashfaq and Ehtisham of murder.
Ehtisham’s counsel, Advocate Sahibzada Riazatul Haq, informed the court that two men, Kalimullah and Aurangzeb, had confessed of killing his client’s wife and two children for bringing disgrace to her family.
However, when officials of the Par Hoti Police Station could not produce the confessional statements in court, the CJ came hard on them saying that it is tantamount to protecting the murders. “What can be more brutal than the police compromising with the assailants? I would be painful to see interference of some influential people in this case,” CJ Khan remarked.
He summoned Deputy Superintendent Police Inayatullah Shah and Sub-Inspector Hasnain Arif to appear before the court on the next hearing.
In the earlier hearing, the CJ had granted bail to Iqbal and Ashfaq and directed the police to investigate the case on scientific lines. He had also directed the police to collect information from local residents so that the case could be taken to a logical conclusion.
According to details, Nargis had eloped with Ehtisham, a taxi driver, and gotten married without her family’s consent.
After the hearing, Advocate Haq told reporters that Nargis’s brothers had offered Arbab Nasir that they would marry one of their sisters off to him if he killed Nargis and her children for disgracing the family’s honour.
Haq said that the family was involved in the killing and told Nargis that the matter is resolved and she can return home without any fear. However, he said that when she returned home she was killed along with her children.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 10th, 2012.
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