Alleged BLA militant acquitted in explosives case as ATC finds serious faults in probe

An anti-terrorism court (ATC) has acquitted an accused in a case pertaining to possession of an explosive material. Mairaj, alias Mama, had been charged with possessing and transporting an explosive material for the purpose of terrorism within the jurisdiction of the Baghdadi police station on April 28, this year.

The ATC-XI judge, who conducted the trial in the judicial complex inside the central prison, ruled that the prosecution "miserably failed to bring home the guilt against present accused beyond any shadow of reasonable doubt."

The judge ordered the jail authorities to release the accused forthwith if he was not required in any other case. He noted that as per the defence side, the accused was picked up from his house on April 21 and his father had subsequently sent applications to the Baghdadi SHO, West and South SSP complaint cell, as well as district and sessions judges of the two districts. "Plausible and confidence inspiring evidence adduced by the accused cannot be thrown away and if the said evidence is put in juxtaposition then it can be presumed that recoveries have been foisted upon the accused," the judge observed.

Pointing out the flaws in the investigation, he said that the investigation officer, Liaquat Ali, admitted that the accused remained in police custody for 14 days, yet he did not ask him from where he had got the explosive material and for what purpose he was having it.

"It seems that prosecution celebrated the mere recovery without getting into trouble of finding how the explosive material landed in the hands of the accused. No efforts [were] made by police to dig as to what the accused was planning to do with this time device,"

he noted.

The judge remarked that the accused was not found having connections with any militant group nor had he provided any facility to militants. He said the arrest was made in a thickly populated area but police did not include private persons as witnesses and no explanation was given by the prosecution in this regard.

"All above circumstances established that the investigation carried out was neither satisfactory nor free from malice and the implication of accused in the present case is not free from doubt." According to the prosecution, on April 28, a patrolling police team spotted a suspicious person near the KMC Dispensary Baghdadi.

He tried to flee the spot after seeing the police but was caught. During his search, one plastic bag appearing to contain explosive material was seized from his possession. Upon arrival, a bomb disposal (BD) team inspected the substance and found a time device with a magnet bomb weighing about one kilogramme, the prosecution mentioned.

State Prosecutor Sardar Ali Solangi argued that the accused was arrested red-handed with the explosive material, adding that witnesses fully supported the prosecution case. The defence lawyer, Safiullah Baloch, however contended that the accused was innocent and had falsely been implicated in the case as he was neither arrested from the place mentioned in the FIR, nor any explosive substance was recovered from his possession. He said his client was picked up by the police on April 21 from his house.

An FIR was lodged under the Section 4/5 of the Explosive Substances Act, 1908 read with the Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act 1997. Earlier, the police had claimed that the accused was associated with the outlawed Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA).