ISLAMABAD: An Islamabad Traffic Police (ITP) official is facing an FIR after he fined a lawyer for driving a car with tinted windows.

Mohammad Baqir, an assistant sub inspector of ITP, on March 20 fined a barrister Ammar Hussain Rs300 near the F-9 Park in Islamabad.

Following the incident, the lawyer approached the Station House Officer (SHO) Margalla police station and filed an application for an FIR to be registered.

When the SHO refused to register the FIR, the barrister filed a petition before the additional district and sessions judge (ADSJ) Wajid Ali for the registration of the FIR against the police official.

The barrister argued before the court that on March 20, when he was going home with his brother and some other people, policemen deployed near the Fatima Jinnah Park in Sector F-9 intercepted him. He alleged that the police officials were disrespectfultowards him, verbally abused him and pointed theirguns at the passengers.

Before appearing for the hearing, Barrister Hussain, a representative of district bar of Islamabad, sent a text message to a number of lawyers and requested them to reach the court of ADSJ All to support him.

Dozens of lawyers appeared before the court during the hearing of the petition. The traffic police official was represented by one lawyer advocate Ashfag Hussain Naqvi.

The order passed by ADSJ Ali states `the local police was under obligation to register an FIR and did not have the power to postpone registration of the FIR.

The plea of the local police that an inquiry is being conducted on the application of the petitioner (barrister Hussain) cannot be accepted as investigation has to follow the registration of the case rather than precede the same.

The judge ordered the concerned SHO of Margalla police station to regis-ter the FIR and investigate the matter in accordance with the law.

Advocate Naqvi told Dawn that this was a glaring example of the `highhandedness` of the black coats. He pointed out that ITP officials dif not have weapons so they could not be accused of pointing a gun towards violators.

`The security on March 20 was on high alert in Islamabad as the Pakistan Day parade was about to resume after a lapse of seven years. The ITP officials were being very careful and the lawyer was fined for driving a car with tinted windows,` he added.

An official deployed at the security checkpost where the incident took place told Dawn that when ITP officials stopped the lawyer, he began shouting at them and threatened them.

He said when the lawyer and his friend were insulting ITP officials, some policemen deployed at the checkpost tried to intervene but the lawyer began threatening them as well. Malik Asad