Expressing its growing impatience with the Punjab Police, the Supreme Court warned it on Thursday that it absolutely must produce by Monday the original file containing the first information report (FIR) and supplementary notes of the investigation officer (IO) in the murder case against Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Appearing on notice, Punjab Advocate General Khawaja Haris Ahmed told the 11-member SC bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry that he and the inspector general of Punjab Police had gone through the police records all of Wednesday night but did not find the file in question.
Expressing dismay over Haris’ statement, the chief justice said, “We need the record of how Bhutto was involved in the murder case, so provide us the record no matter what.” Expressing concern over the publication of an affidavit of one of the public prosecutors in the Bhutto case, named Anwar, in a newspaper, the chief justice told the government’s counsel Dr Babar Awan that the court was “aware of who is doing this”, and also understood the objective behind the act.
Awan provided the court proof of Bhutto’s death warrant issued by Maulvi Mushtaq Hussain, saying he was the first judge in the world who signed the death warrants of a prime minister.
