The weak prosecution system in Pakistan helps accused, even suspected terrorists, to go free, and despite repeated observations of the courts in this regard, still has been no improvement in the system. The worsening law and order situation in the country cannot be controlled without improving prosecution. On Friday, the Supreme Court expressed severe dismay over the government when it was informed by Sindh Advocate General Abdul Fatah Malik that an accused, who had confessed killing about 100 people in Karachi, was acquitted by a court.
The court noted that the accused was acquitted due to lack of evidence, whose responsibility lied on the prosecution. The court observed that the government had to devise a standard to provide solid evidences so that the accused could be punished. Due to weak prosecution, over two dozen suspected terrorists were acquitted of the charge during the last one year by the trial courts only in Rawalpindi and Islamabad, which sounds alarming.
These over two dozens suspected terrorists went free because the prosecution failed to prove their connections with the seven terror attacks they were said to have a hand in. The prosecution’s cases collapsed when the trial courts found the witnesses and confessional statements unreliable and unfounded.
According to a senior criminal lawyer Shaukat Siddiqui, the prosecution in the cases of suicide attacks overwhelmingly relied on eyewitnesses to the incidents who later identify the suspects during the identification parade in jails.
However, the prosecution cases were usually weak legally, where eyewitnesses were found by the investigators after the accused have been arrested, he said. Ideally, testimonies of the eyewitnesses should be recorded soon after the incident and not after the accused were arrested, he added.
He said the main reason for the acquittal of over two dozen terror suspects during the last one year was that the prosecution could not prove the circumstances in which the suspects were arrested. In almost all the cases, he said the families of the suspects alleged that the suspects had disappeared long before the police found them.
Most recently, the Rawalpindi bench of the Lahore High Court acquitted nine men as the prosecution could not prove that they had been arrested from a house on the outskirts of Rawalpindi cantonment, Siddiqui said.
He said these nine men had been arrested and accused of the murder of Surgeon General Mushtaq Baig and for possessing explosives. However, they were acquitted earlier of the murder. But this year, though a magistrate had convicted nine men for carrying explosive material and illegal weapons, the high court set aside the conviction. This decision came because the prosecution could not satisfy the court about the identity of the owner of the house in which these nine men were supposed to have been living at the time of the arrest.
Due to poor prosecution, hundreds and thousands suspects of murder go free, thus the prosecution needs to be improved.
The miseries of the down-trodden deepen and worsen when he is deprived of justice by the lower judiciary, mostly due to poor prosecution. It is commonly acknowledged that majority of criminal cases are not reported to the police and the rare cases which are reported are not registered by the police. It is also a common knowledge that the majority of the cases registered by the policy are not properly processed. Even those cases which are processed by the police are so weak and faulty in preparation that they fail to receive any serious consideration in the courts.
This situation encourages the people to settle accounts on their own. People are not ready to come for evidence in the courts due to lack of protection, as the state has failed to provide proper security to the witnesses.
The security agencies are not at all concerned with the security of the people. It has been observed that the security agencies have perhaps, forgotten altogether that they are not primarily responsible to protect the VIPs; instead, their primary responsibility is to ensure safety and security of the common people.
It may be noted here that the only state organ which still enjoys some confidence of the people is the superior judiciary, particularly the Supreme Court. Although, some decisions in cases of political nature in the past have compromised the dignity of the Supreme Court, yet, the common man feels that the only ray of hope comes from the courtrooms of the superior judiciary.