Web Desk (LTN NEWS): On Monday, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) told the federal government and the interior secretary to appoint a retired high court judge as an inquiry officer to look into Shahbaz Gill’s claims that he was tortured while in police custody.
Acting IHC Chief Justice Aamir Farooq ruled against Gill’s request to be sent back to the police for more physical remand. He said that during Gill’s physical remand, a senior superintendent of police should watch over him and make sure he doesn’t get hurt.
Justice Farooq said that the court didn’t want to set a bad example that would make the high court too busy with remand cases tomorrow. But the judge said that Gill’s case was not just about his being kept in jail.
The person in charge of the investigation told the court that Gill made the controversial statement on TV from the home of PTI Chairman Imran Khan in Bani Gala. He said that Gill read his statement out loud from a cell phone, which had to be found and tested.
Lawyer General Jahangir Jadoon of Islamabad asked the court to pay attention to a threat made by Imran Khan against a sessions judge. Shoaib Shaheen’s lawyer said that Imran had been charged with terrorism and that the law would do what it needs to do.
Gill, who works for Imran Khan, the leader of the PTI, was arrested on August 9 after a sedition case was filed at the Kohsar police station in the federal capital over his controversial comments to a private TV channel.
The next day, he went before a judge, and on August 12, he was sent to the Adiala jail on judicial remand. The prosecution went to the Islamabad sessions court and then to the IHC to appeal the rejection of physical remand.
The IHC sent the case back to the sessions court so that the request for remand could be looked at again. After hearing the request for a review, additional sessions judge Zeba Chaudhry gave Gill to the Islamabad police for two days.
But the PTI went to the IHC to fight the physical remand. The party also said that while Gill was in police custody, he was brutally tortured. On Thursday, when Justice Farooq heard the case, he asked the inspector general of the Islamabad police for a report about the claims of torture.
Gill’s lawyer, Salman Safdar, told the court on Monday that his client had been tortured very badly. He also said that Gill’s private parts had been hurt. But he confirmed the latest videos on social media that show Gill looking healthy.
Safdar said that it was normal for police in Pakistan to torture people who were in jail. He also said that the effects of torture only lasted for five or six days. He went on to say that after 12 days, even the worst pain is gone. Now, Gill’s health was getting better, as videos that got out on Sunday showed.
Special Prosecutor Raja Rizwan Abbasi told the court that Gill needed to be kept in custody and that his regular phone had been found, but his smartphone had not yet been found. He also said that 90% of the police work on the case hadn’t been done yet.
He also said that more people could be arrested in the case because of what Gill said and that they would have to face the police. When the court said that no one else had been arrested yet, the Islamabad Advocate General said that more research was needed before those arrests could be made.
Also, as the court told Islamabad IG Akbar Nasir Khan to do, he turned in a preliminary report that said Gill’s claims that he was tortured were not true. The IG said that there was no proof that people were physically, mentally, or sexually tortured while in police custody or jail.
The report also had Gill’s recorded statement, in which he said again that he was stripped naked and tortured on the day he was arrested. The report said that there were no signs of torture on Gill’s body when he was checked out by doctors from the jail and PIMS Hospital.
Based on the police and jail officials’ statements, PTI members’ statements, video clips, photos, and medical reports, the report said that the accused had not been tortured until he was sent to Adiala Jail.
