PESHAWAR: A local court on Monday confirmed the pre-arrest bails of MPA Fazal Ilahi and four other leaders of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) in a case registered against them for demonstrating in the Red Zone here after the Nov 3 gun attack on former prime minister Imran Khan.

Additional district and sessions judge Aftab Iqbal pronounced the order after lawyers for the suspects and the state finished arguments.

Early this month, the Peshawar police had informed the deputy speaker of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly about their plans to arrest the MPA in the case in light of an FIR registered by the East Cantonment police station on Nov 3, 2022.

In a letter to Mahmood Jan, Peshawar’s capital city police officer Mohammad Ijaz Khan said MPA Fazal Elahi of the PK-79 constituency was wanted by the East Cantonment police in the case.

However, Mr Ilahi and four other party leaders, including former Peshawar district nazim Arbab Mohammad Asim, Irfan Saleem, Meena Khan and Ayaz Khan, filed pre-arrest bail petitions with the high court, which initially granted them interim bails.

Their lawyer says peaceful rally fundamental right of his clients

President of the Peshawar Bar Association Ali Zaman appeared for the petitioners and contended that his clients were implicated in a fake case as no offence had taken place on the day in question.

He added that workers of the PTI had staged a protest after learning about an attempt on the life of their leader Imran Khan.

The counsel argued that the participants were unarmed, didn’t damage any public property and just shouted slogans against the federal government.

He pointed out that holding peaceful protest and taking out a procession was the fundamental right guaranteed under the Constitution.

Mr Zaman argued that there was no notified Red Zone in Peshawar or any other city as such zones were declared during wartime and presently Pakistan was not at war with any country.

He argued that the prosecution had not produced any notification to show that the roads where the protest was held was the Red Zone and any protest there was prohibited.

FIR of the protest was registered under the Pakistan Penal Code’s sections 341 (punishment for wrongful restraint), 353 (assault or criminal force against a person) and 427 (mischief causing damage).

SHO Naeem Haider, the complainant in the case, insisted that 250-300 political workers started procession from Hasthnagri area against attack on Imran Khan and proceeded towards the Red Zone on the Khyber Road.

He alleged that the police tried to stop the protesters but they climbed over an armoured personnel carrier of the police and damaged it by hitting it with batons.

The complainant claimed that the protesters were raising different slogans and had also disrupted flow of traffic. He added that they gathered outside the Chief Minister House and later on dispersed near east Cant police station.

The protesters gathered outside the Peshawar corps commander’s house and shouted slogans but the police didn’t mention that in the FIR and just said that the protesters entered the Red Zone.

Initially, the police didn’t charge any party leader by name and said that through the CCTV camera footage, they had been trying to identify protesters.

Published in Dawn, December 20th, 2022