LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Monday ordered the Station House Officer (SHO) of the Naseerabad Police Station to present missing peace activist Raza Mehmood Khan at the next hearing scheduled for Dec 22.
Justice Qazi Ameen Ahmad ordered the Attorney General and the SHO to retrieve Raza and present him before the court within four days.
In the previous hearing on Dec 13, the court had ordered the SHO to submit his answer on Dec 19. The case was being heard by Justice Anwarul Haq at the time. Raza’s brother Hamid Nasir Mehmood had filed the petition invoking Article 199 of the Constitution of Pakistan.
He maintained that the respondents in the case, including the government of Pakistan, government of Punjab, Punjab Police Inspector General and the SHO of Naseerabad police station, ‘be issued a notice and directed to search for the abductee and to report to this Honourable Court, the location and the circumstances under which the abductee disappeared’.
Raza had gone missing on Dec 2 after he attended a talk on the issue of Faizabad sit-in.
Volunteers from Aaghaz-e-Dosti, an Indo-Pak friendship initiative, said after the last hearing that allowing the respondent six days to submit the answer in a habeas corpus case could lead to unnecessary delays while the family of the missing person was highly concerned about his life and safety. They had expressed complete trust in Pakistan’s judicial system.