KARACHI: An antiterrorism court (ATC) acquitted a man, said to be associated with the outlawed Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), in a case pertaining to possession of explosives for lack of evidence.

On April 27, accused Mairaj, alias Mama, was arrested within the remit of the Baghdadi police station and during a search a box with black tape containing a “time device and magnet bomb” was recovered from him. The police claimed that he was associated with the banned BLA as he did recce of their targets and used to provide information about security institutions.

However, the ATC-XI judge, who conducted the trial in the judicial complex inside the central prison, acquitted the accused and ruled that the prosecution has failed to prove charges beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt.

The court highlighted lacunas in the prosecution case and noted that the investigating officer admitted in his cross-examination that the accused remained in police custody for 14 days. However, the IO failed to ask the accused from where he got the explosives and for what purpose.

“No efforts [were] made by police to dig as to what the accused was planning to do with this time device, which on the face of it is not confidence aspiring,” the court observed.

The court also noted that complainant ASI Muhammad Ejaz admitted that the place of arrest of the accused was a “thickly populated area”, despite this the police did not included any private witness in this case.

The court highlighted discrepancies in the prosecution’s evidence regarding timing of the arrest, sealing of evidence, forensic examination, etc.

During the trial, defence counsel Safiullah Baloch pleaded that his client was picked up from his house on April 21. He submitted that the father of his client had sent applications to the concerned police officials and district judges of South and West.

The court noted that the accused had produced photocopies of applications along with courier receipts and biometric affidavits from his father, but during investigation, the IO had failed to examine this.

A case was registered at the Baghdadi police station under Section 4/5 of the Explosive Substance Act read with Section 7 of the Anti-terrorism Act of 1997.

Published in Dawn, November 5th, 2024