A Lahore High Court (LHC) division bench Tuesday suspended death warrants of a prisoner who was scheduled to be hanged on March 11 at the Faisalabad Central Jail.
The bench comprising Justice Syed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi and Justice Syed Shahbaz Ali Rizvi passed the orders on a petition filed by convict Qaisar alias Bila challenging his death warrants.
During the hearing, the convict’s counsel arguing before the court submitted that Anti-Terrorism Court Faisalabad awarded death penalty to the convict in 2002 in a case registered with Police Station Ghulam Muhammad Abad Faisalabad against him for murdering Muhammad Shafique.
He pointed out that the Apex Court upheld the sentence but the heirs of the deceased pardoned the convict later. But the ATC accepted the pardoned dead to the extent of murder charge and upheld death sentence in other charges, he added.
He contended that the pardoned dead was also applicable on other charges since it had been accepted in main offence.
He pleaded the court to set aside the death warrants issued by the ATC.
The bench after hearing the arguments suspended the death warrants of the convict and issued notices to the parties for March 16.