KARACHI: The Sindh High Court has ruled that the excise police have no powers to investigate and prosecute suspects in drug-peddling offences. They should hand over such suspects along with the seized drugs to the official in charge of the nearest police station for investigation and prosecution.

A two-judge bench comprising Justice Nazar Akbar and Justice Zulfiqar Ahmad Khan directed the director general of excise and taxation and also SHOs of excise police stations across Sindh to ensure that such illegality on the part of the excise police was stopped forthwith.

The investigation as well as prosecution of all such pending cases registered by the excise police be transferred to the police stations concerned strictly in accordance with the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997, the bench ordered.

The bench also asked for the details of pending cases registered by the excise police under the CNS Act and said that the same should immediately be sent to this court through the member inspection team (MIT-II).

It explained that a suspect arrested under Section 21 of the CNS Act must be handed over to the official in charge of the nearest police station with immediate information to his superiors as a mandatory requirement and that non-observation of mandatory law would not only create serious doubts in the case of prosecution but could also benefit the accused.

The bench issued these directives while allowing an appeal filed by a man against conviction by a trial court and pointed out several legal flaws in the investigation and prosecution on account of illegal action taken by the assistant excise and taxation officer (AETO) and said that the same had not been noticed by the trial court.

The sessions court/model criminal trial court had sentenced the appellant, Akhtar Meen, to life imprisonment in October 2019 for transporting 13kg of hashish by a rickshaw in the previous month.

The bench further directed the excise and taxation DG to take strict disciplinary action against the excise and taxation officer, Sheraz Gul Thebo, for his failure to follow the basic criminal law from registration of the FIR to the arrest and recovery of narcotic as well as illegally sending the appellant for detention in the excise police station.

It further observed that the officer had also failed to show the rickshaw as a case property and had been unable to investigate about owner of the rickshaw. He produced the documents in court under this own attestation without producing the authors of such documents.

The bench ruled that there were “several dents in the prosecution story against the appellant, the action taken by the officer against the appellant after his arrest and alleged seizure of hashish while performing function under Section 21(1) of the CNS Act was illegal, void ab-initio and without any lawful authority and therefore, the entire trial has been vitiated”.

The bench had also made similar observations in another case and directed the Pakistan Coast Guards (PCG) director general that the investigation as well as prosecution of all pending cases registered by the PCG be transferred to authorised investigating and prosecuting agencies.

Published in Dawn, June 22nd, 2021