LAHORE: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Tuesday indicted former Punjab police chief Mushtaq Sukhera besides 115 others in a case pertaining to the Model Town carnage.
The former Punjab inspector general of police pleaded not guilty and opted to contest the charges against him.
Sukhera appeared before Judge Aijaz Hasan and denied the charges levelled against him. His counsel submitted Rs5 million in surety bonds along with a request to excuse Sukhera’s presence for the next hearings.
At the outset of the hearing, Sukhera requested the ATC judge to put off the indictment proceedings for a week and refused to sign the document. The judge, while rejecting his request, directed the former top police officer to sign the indictment.
The hearing was adjourned till Wednesday and prosecution witnesses were summoned to record their testimonies.
Last week, Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) chief Dr Tahirul Qadri had appeared before a Supreme Court bench as it took up the Model Town case.
The three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar, was hearing a petition filed by Bisma, one of the affectees of the Model Town incident, at the apex court’s Lahore registry.
The PAT chief had pleaded the bench to constitute a new joint investigation team (JIT) to probe the Model Town incident afresh.
He had contended that it was important to constitute a new probe team as the matter couldn’t be fairly investigated in the past. The accused were themselves complainants in the previous JIT and he didn’t expect to get justice from the partial inquiry team, he added.
Dr Tahirul Qadri claimed that the JIT recorded one-sided testimonies as per its wishes and the affectees didn’t appear before it out of fear and pressure from the then government.
After hearing initial arguments, the bench had issued a notice to the provincial government to submit its response to the plea seeking constitution of a new JIT to probe the incident.
It directed the relevant anti-terrorism court to take up the Model Town cases twice a week instead of daily and summon relevant officials.