Drug peddler sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison

A special court for the Control of Narcotic Substances (CNS) on Friday sentenced a man to seven and a half years in prison in a drugs case. Ali Khan was found guilty of possessing over four kilogrammes of charas near Murtaza Chowrangi in May 2020.

Judge Kamran Atta Soomro of the Special Court-I (CNS) observed that the prosecution successfully proved its charge against the accused beyond reasonable doubt and awarded him seven and a half years of rigorous imprisonment.

The convict was ordered to pay a fine of Rs35,000 or undergo additional imprisonment on default. The accused, who appeared in the court on bail, was taken into custody and remanded to the Central Prison Karachi to serve the jail term.

According to the prosecution, the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) received spy that accused Ali Khan would deliver narcotics to his customer near Data Darbar Hotel, Murtaza Chowrangi, on May 23, 2020. Acting on this tip-off, a raiding party reached the pointed location and saw Ali Khan coming from Mansehra Colony with one blue-coloured plastic bag in his hand.

Upon search, the bag was found to contain four packets of charas, the prosecution said, adding that two of the packets weighed 1,200 grams each and the other two weighed 1,100 grams each, bringing the total weight of the recovered packets, including packing material, to 4,600 grams. The defence counsel contended that his client was innocent and had been falsely implicated in the case. He said the accused was bitten by a dog and therefore went to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medical treatment on May 23, but was picked up by the ANF authorities.