Sindh Home Minister Ziaul Hassan Lanjar on Thursday assured the judicial commission probing possible negligence in the Mir Raza Ali murder case that the provincial government did not intend to “impede” its proceedings, following the Sindh advocate general’s (AG) interruption during the previous hearing.
On Tuesday, Sindh AG Jawad Dero interrupted the proceedings when he objected to the lawyer representing the victims’ family asking questions during police surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed’s testimony. The commission then summoned Lanjar to clarify the government’s position.
On Thursday, the home minister appeared before the commission and tendered an “unconditional apology over the misunderstanding”, he told the media after the hearing.
Lanjar said the Sindh government wanted the victim’s family to be provided justice and for the facts to emerge, terming the conclusion of the commission’s proceedings “necessary”.
“I also said before the commission today that whoever is found involved in this will be punished,” the minister added.
According to the commission’s order for Thursday’s hearing, Lanjar clarified that a misunderstanding had occurred at the previous hearing and “that it was not the government’s instruction that the commission be told how to run its proceedings, nor that any impediment be caused in answering the family’s questions”.
Sindh High Court’s Justice Omar Sial, who heads the commission, noted that the minister assured the commission and the public of his government’s “uninterrupted, continuous and complete co-operation” in the proceedings.
Jibran Nasir, the lawyer representing the Ali’s family, also requested the commission to place on record their appreciation for Lanjar’s clarification, the order said.
“The controversy thus stands amicably resolved,” Justice Sial wrote.
During the proceedings, Justice Sial said the panel had repeatedly called for negligence in the case to be identified and noted that the Sindh chief minister also held the same view.
He said the concerns and suspicions of Ali’s family needed to be taken into consideration, observing that the parents had “very little confidence” in the investigation.
“Our effort is to restore their confidence through the commission and bring the facts of the case to light,” Justice Sial said. He added that the family had been allowed to ask questions through their lawyer.
Justice Sial also criticised the Sindh AG’s intervention during the previous hearing, saying it had “added fuel to the fire” and was “very humiliating” for him.
He said the commission wanted to know whether the provincial government’s stance remained the same as that expressed by Sindh Assembly Standing Committee on Home’s Chairperson Faryal Talpur and others when the judicial panel was established.
Apologising to the judicial panel, Lanjar affirmed that the government wanted justice to be delivered to everyone. He said that, as the home minister, he was saddened by the loss suffered by the family and, as a father, he understood their grief.
Recalling that Talpur had sought the formation of a judicial commission, Lanjar said the Sindh government would provide whatever the family needed and submit any evidence required.
“We do not want to interfere in the commission’s proceedings,” Lanjar said, adding that the panel could conduct the inquiry in whatever manner it deemed appropriate.
“We do not want anyone to think that the Sindh government does not want an investigation,” he said.
The commission ordered Dr Syed, Ferozabad Station House Officer (SHO) Adeel Afzal and Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station Head Moharir Zeeshan to appear before it at the next hearing at 11am on September 14 (Monday).
SHO Afzal is deployed at the Ferozabad police station, where the case was initially registered under charges of kidnapping following Ali’s disappearance on July 28. His body was found a day later, and following Ali’s second autopsy in August, the probe was transferred to the Zaman Town police station, with murder charges added to the case.
Head Moharir Zeeshan is among those who visited the crime scene after Ali’s body was found.
The commission also received a response from Medico-Legal Officer (MLO) Dr Osama Sheikh, who had conducted Ali’s first post-mortem examination, to a show-cause notice issued over his demeanour towards a journalist.
However, it found the MLO’s reply to be “unsatisfactory and evasive” and directed him to appear before the commission at 11am on September 15 (Tuesday) to explain his response.
Citizens share leads with commission
Meanwhile, the judicial commission’s registrar, Abdul Majid, said he had received messages and emails from citizens claiming to have information that could help in the case.
One of them offered to assist the commission regarding Ali’s Binance accounts, which the police have said the deceased was using for the past four years.
The registrar said another citizen shared information regarding Ali’s “digital footprints”, which would be shared with the investigation team.
One informant pointed towards a “suspicious individual”, calling for him to be investigated, while another person offered information related to Ali’s iCloud login.
The registrar assured the public that the identities of those reaching out to the commission will be kept confidential.
The case so far
The body of 25-year-old Ali was found in Karachi’s Gulistan-i-Jauhar last month, a day after he went missing on July 28.
Days after the recovery of Ali’s body on July 29, Dr Syed had told Geo News that the post-mortem findings in the case had raised several questions, as some observations in the report did not appear to match the available photographs.
On August 6, a Karachi court took up an application by Ali’s father, allowed the exhumation of his body, ordered the formation of a medico-legal board for the purpose and directed that a second autopsy of Ali’s body be conducted.
The Sindh health department then constituted an eight-member board, with police surgeon Dr Syed as the convener. However, in the early hours of August 7, the board was reconstituted through an order issued by the director general of the Sindh health department.
While Dr Syed remained the convener of the new five-member board, its members were changed.
But Ali’s family rejected the new board, which also resulted in the deferment of the planned exhumation on Friday. Meanwhile, the counsel for Ali’s family, Nasir, accused the authorities of trying to bury the facts.
The Sindh government then restored the original medical board, following which Ali’s body was exhumed on August 8.
A day later, the Sindh inspector general of police’s (IG) office notified the reconstitution of the investigating team probing Ali’s death while Karachi Additional IG Azad Khan transferred the investigation into Ali’s murder to Zaman Town police station from Ferozabad Police Station, where the case was registered under charges of kidnapping.
The order for the probe team’s reconstitution also showed that a murder charge had been added to the first information report.
The same day, the Sindh government decided to seek a judicial commission for the case’s investigation, only to defer the plan a day later after Ali’s family said they had made no such demand and had faith in the new investigation team.
On Aug 19, Ali’s parents, Mir Hussain and Mariam Hussain, wrote to Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, seeking his “direct supervision of the murder investigation”. They also urged the chief minister to order an investigation and departmental inquiry into the previous investigation team and immediately suspend the officers involved.
The provincial government acknowledged the letter and announced the decision on Aug 23 to form a judicial commission to determine whether the investigation in the case was being conducted impartially and to investigate the circumstances surrounding Ali’s death.
However, the counsel for Ali’s family approached the SHC, objecting to the provincial government’s decision to form a judicial commission and seeking the formation of an independent and multi-agency JIT “comprising officers who have had no previous involvement in the case”.
On Sept 2, the SHC dismissed a petition filed by Ali’s family, seeking the formation of a JIT to probe his murder, observing that constituting such a body was the “prerogative of the government”.
Meanwhile, the final report of Ali’s second post-mortem for the Mir Raza Ali murder case confirmed that his death was caused by a gunshot wound to the back.
“Death occurred due to cardiac rupture consequent to perforating firearm injury of the chest,” the report stated, adding that the entry wound was on the posterior thorax (back) and the exit wound on the anterior thorax (front of the chest).
“The findings are inconsistent with suicide as the manner of death,” it confirmed.
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