KARACHI: The Sindh High Court has overturned a life imprisonment handed down to a man in a case pertaining to the murder of his neighbour.

The SHC observed that the wife of an appellant, Qurat-ul-Ain, who had became an approver and deposed against her husband before the trial court, was a dishonest witness and should not have been treated as an approver since her testimony was inadmissible evidence.

A sessions court had sentenced Mehboob Ali alias Bobby to life in prison in February 2015 for killing his neighbour Aliya during a robbery at her house in a Nazimabad locality in November 2009.

The prosecution said that husband of the victim, Naveed Qureshi, came to know through the newspaper that an unidentified body of a woman had been found in the Nazimabad area in a gunny bag and identified the same as the dead body of his wife Aliya.

The convict through his counsel had filed an appeal against his conviction.

After hearing arguments and examining record and proceedings, the single-judge bench of SHC headed by Justice Omar Sial allowed the appeal and exonerated the appellant.

The bench in its order observed that Qurat-ul-Ain was arrested around five months after the incident and a couple of days later things took a turn when the woman had recorded what was termed as a “confession statement” before a magistrate.

“The entire case hinges on the fact that Qurat-ul Ain, who was Mehboob’s accomplice in the crime, made a confession, was tendered pardon, made an approver, recorded her testimony at trial and whatever she said was used to convict and sentence Mehboob,” it added.

The bench further said the prosecution alleged that jewellery stolen from the victim was also recovered on a lead provided by the appellant, but the recovery was doubtful as the story narrated by Qurat-ul-Ain as to how victim’s jewellery reached Mehboob did not sound realistic while the deceased’s husband could not realise till five months that jewellery had been taken off was odd in itself.

It also questioned that whether Qurat-ul-Ain statement recorded under Section 164 of the criminal procedure code could be termed a confession as she did not make an admission of guilt, but has taken the plea that she herself was a victim of the appellant’s aggression and cruelty and not once did she say that she had aided, abetted or helped Mehboob in any manner whatsoever.

An approver is always an accomplice and an accomplice is a person who knowingly, voluntarily, and intentionally unites with the principal offender in committing a crime while an accused can only be pardoned if the legal heirs of the victim give their consent, it added.

The bench further said that apparently district public prosecutor as well as the learned trial court judge erred in approving the tender of pardon to Qurat-ul-Ain as DPP in his capacity as in-charge of the prosecution in the district tendered the pardon to Qurat-ul-Ain.

The procedure followed to give her a tender of pardon was flawed, recovery of the jewellery was highly doubtful and the place of incident and the identity of the dead body also remained suspicious, it concluded.

During the arguments, the lawyer for the appellant claimed that Mehboob was innocent and in fact after death of Aliya, Qurat-ul-Ain had married Naveed Qureshi, complainant and husband of deceased, and it was the bait given to her by the complainant to falsely implicate her own husband.

Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2022