ISLAMABAD:
Supreme Court has expressed concern over the rising threats against petitioners and family of slain social activist Perveen Rehman, unless they agree to drop the case. Rehman, one of the country’s top development workers and director of the Orangi Pilot Project (OPP), was gunned down in Karachi in March 2013.
The Supreme Court was assured on Monday that the principal accused in the mysterious murder of Orangi Pilot Project director Perween Rehman would be arrested soon.
DIG Sindh Sultan Ali Khawaja and SSP Karachi Pir Mohammad Shah informed a two-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Nasir-ul-Mulk that they had contacted the Malakand police through some mediators for the arrest of Naeem Swati.
On Monday, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) counsel Raheel Kamran Sheikh, along with 11 other petitioners told the court that in May, police had asked them to drop the case because the ‘threat level’ was increasing.
On May 30, two unknown armed men came to the residence of Rehman’s sister and threatened her mother with dire consequences.
The police, however, did not take any action.
Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk, who heads the three-judge bench, told the Criminal Investigation Agency (CIA) Karachi DIG Sultan Khawaja, who is supervising the investigation team, that the top court had taken notice itself and would not allow the petitioners to withdraw this “case of public importance”.