Missing draft of constitution: Prove theft claims, SHC tells petitioner

Court asked to press interior ministry to register a case and ensure recovery of original document.

KARACHI:

The Sindh High Court on Tuesday asked a petitioner to prove the maintainability of his plea for the lodging of a case on the alleged theft of the original document of the 1973 Constitution.

“Before issuing notice we would like to hear the petitioner’s counsel on the maintainability of this petition, for which he requests time,” observed a two-judge bench, headed by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar.

Agha Attaullah Shah, chairman of the Raah-e-Rast Trust, had taken the federal interior ministry and Islamabad police chief to court for not entertaining his plea to lodge a case involving the theft of the original draft of the constitution.

The petitioner claimed that reports published by different news websites were true and the original draft of the constitution was indeed missing.

“The original manuscript bearing the signatures of all the then Constituent Assembly members and the then president has been lost,” Shah said.

“Ever since then the authenticated document of the Constitution of 1973 has never been seen in the records of the Parliament House,” said Shah, citing sources.

Recalling incidents when access to the original draft of the Constitution was denied, the petitioner said that before approving the 18th Amendment, former speaker of the National Assembly Fehmida Mirza had requested to see the original document of the Constitution. But she was informed that the original draft was missing from the assembly’s records.

He pleaded with the court to declare the original document of the constitution “the most important and authentic document” and any conspiracy to play with its validity, credibility, authenticity and genuineness should be dealt with legal action.

The next hearing of the case was adjourned till October 7.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 4^th, 2013.