ISLAMABAD, Jan 6: The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Punjab government to suspend senior police officers and doctors, co-accused in the murder of four civil judges in the Sialkot Jail.

"Why the officers have not yet been suspended," Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry inquired of Punjab Additional Advocate-General Afshan Ghazanfar and observed that these officers could tamper with evidence if they remained in uniform.

The three-member bench, comprising Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, Justice Rana Bhagwandas and Justice Mian Shakirullah Jan, directed the Lahore High Court to dispose of bail applications of these police officers and doctors.

The officers who were granted bail before arrest are: Deputy Inspector-General Gujranwala Malik Mohammad Iqbal, Ex-District Police Officer Sialkot Amjad Javed Saleemi, DPO Gujrat Raja Munawar Hussain, Dr Mohammad Firdous Shah and Dr Sajid Hussain of the Allama Iqbal Memorial Hospital Sialkot. In all, 17 police officials were granted interim bail.

The apex court made these observations while hearing two petitions, one by ex-superintendent Sialkot Jail Sikandar Hayat and the other by Syed Ghulam Abbas Bokhari, father of one of the murdered judges.

Mr Hayat, one of the co-accused who is in the police custody, had challenged the dismissal of his bail petition by the LHC while Mr Bokhari had filed the petition against the grant of bail to other co-accused officers. The Supreme Court will now take up the matter on Jan 18.

The bench asked the advocate-general to either write to the Punjab chief minister or the chief secretary to take immediate action. Justice Iftikhar said that letting these officers to continue holding their posts was a mockery of law.

Sessions judge Chaudhry Zafar Hussain, civil judges and judicial magistrates were visiting the Sialkot Jail on July 25, 2003 to hear complaints of prisoners when they were fired upon by jail inmates Ashfaq, Shahbaz, Ijaz, Mohammad Rafiq and Munir.

Chaudhry Zafar took refuge in the office of the jail superintendent, but his companions were taken hostage by the culprits. Negotiations between the authorities and the captors failed before the police conducted an operation to recover the judges.

Civil judges Saghir Ahmed, Asif Mohammad Cheema and Shahid Munir Ranjha were killed in the clash while Shaharyar Bokhari succumbed to injuries later. Sibtain Raza and Javed Iqbal, also civil judges, were wounded. The prisoners, who had taken the judges hostage, were also killed in the operation.