KARACHI: Taking exception to an attempt to interrupt its proceedings by the chief provincial law officer, the judicial commission on Tuesday directed Sindh Home Minister Zia Lanjar to appear before it and explain whether the family of slain Mir Raza Ali was barredfrom asking questions to the witnesses duringproceedings.
The one-member commission headed by Justice Omar Sial of the Sindh High Court also deplored the fact that the interruption came from Advocate General (AG) Jawad Dero when the police surgeon was explaining the role of senior police officers during the first post-mortem examination of Mir Raza.
The commission further stated that the AG had objected to requests made by Raza’s family, through their lawyer, for certain clarification during the testimony of the police surgeon.
It said Tuesday’s proceedings were aborted due to a deliberate attempt by the AG to restrain the commission from addressing the aggrieved family’s queries in a transparent manner, and further dates will be communicated to wit-nesses after the home minister’s stance was put forward.
At the outset of the hearing, Police Surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed turned up and took around 45 minutes to thoroughly inform the commission about the entire procedure of autopsy from arrival of a body at a government hospital to the submission of the post-mortem report by the MLOs and also elaborated various relevant provisions of the Sindh MedicoLegal Act, 2023.
She replied in the negative when the commission asked her whether she had participated in the first autopsy, which was conducted by medico-legal officer (MLO) Dr Osama Sheikh.
The police surgeon provided a complete record of the WhatsApp chat between her and MLO Sheikh about the autopsy of Mir, and the same was alsodisplayed on the screen in the courtroom.
Dr Syed deposed that she was in contact with the MLO, who had shared pictures of the body on the evening of July 29, and he said it was a two-day-old body with a gunshot wound.
She said, ‘Thereafter, I had asked the MLO to provide the pictures of the backside of the body taken in the mortuary and how he could say that it was a couple of days old, but he could not share the same and provided a picture of the initial post-mortem report.
The police surgeon also testified that on July 31, the MLO informed her through the chat about the bullet injury on the chest. He had informed her that the autopsy report was submitted, but in fact he had kept the reportin the lockerofthe medico-legal department since the police surgeon’s office was closed on Saturday (Aug 1).
However, the police surgeon, who was part of a medical board which conducted the second autopsy after exhumation of Raza’s body, stated that the report was handed over to the police whilethe file of Raza’s first autopsy never came into her possession.
She deposed that she had pointed out 14 points/ lapses after examining the soft copy of the first post-mortem report, since the entry and exit points of the bullet did not match with pictures and especially with a photo of Mr Raza’s heart taken during the procedure, while she also did not agree with the observa-tion of the MLO about the size of exit and entry points of the bullet wound.
She also contended that on Aug 31, Karachi police chief Azad Khan had spoken to her over phone about another issue andatthe end ofthe conversation they also spoke about Raza’s case for hardly 15 to 20 seconds, during which he said that it was a straightforward case of suicide.However, she said that she had informed him that it was not a case of suicide.
She said the MLO had collected samples during autopsy and handed them over to police on July 29.
At this juncture, Advocate Jibran Nasir, who is representing the parents and sister of Raza, informed the commission that the police had submitted these samples for analysis on Aug 6and this may affect the results.
The commission asked the police surgeon whether the delay of around nine days could change the results. She replied that it varied case to case and could not exclusively give an opinion on the subject issue.
Thereafter, Advocate Nasir again attempted to point out another question for the police surgeon when AG Dero, present in the courtroom, objected and submitted that it was the discretion of the commission to ask questions to witnesses and the counsel for the complainant family was not authorised to do so.
The commission expressed resentment towards the AG and asked whether he was threatening the commission and restraining it from taking questions from the aggrieved family.The AG also attempted to apologise. However, the hearing was aborted by Justice Sial, who said that he was issuing a notice to the Sindh home minister to appear on Sept 10 and put forward his stance.
The commission in its written order said, ‘It is regrettable that the commission’s proceedings have been interrupted by Sindh Advocate General Jawad Dero. He has objected to the family’s counsel asking any questions on behalf of the deceased’s family.
‘The highest law officer of the Sindh government making such a submission surprised me.
It is more meaningful that the disturbance comes at a time when the police surgeon was explaining the role of senior police officers during the post-mortem examination,’ it said.