KARACHI: An antiterrorism court (ATC) has sentenced a man to a total of 28 years in prison in an explosives case.

The ATC- XIII judge, who conducted the trial in the Judicial Complex inside the Karachi central prison, found accused Muhammad Ashraf guilty and sentenced him to 14-year imprisonment each for possessing the grenade and to create “panic and terror in the minds of the general public”.

The court also imposed a total fine of Rs200,000 on the convict.

“The recovery of the hand-grenade from the exclusive possession of the accused is proved through tangible evidence, which has come on the record straight away from the mouth of the witnesses and same has been confidence-inspiring and trustworthy supported by the BDU [Bomb Disposable Unit] report and contains only a few minor inconsistencies, which have no effect on the outcome of the case. Therefore, I hold that the findings of guilt for the commission of the offences against the accused does not suffer from any infirmity,” the judge ruled in the verdict.

Earlier, the same court had convicted the accused in this case last year. However, he had challenged the judgement before the Sindh High Court (SHC). After hearing the petitioner, the SHC remanded the case back to the ATC for recording the statement of the accused under Section 342 of the criminal procedure code and the testimony a BDU inspector.

According to the prosecution, on April 21, 2023 police got a tip-off that a person was carrying some explosives near the football ground in Saeedabad. A police patrol reached the scene, searched the suspect and found a grenade from his possession.

A case was registered at the Saeedabad police station under Sections 4/5 of the Explosive Substances Act, read with Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act.

Published in Dawn, November 25th, 2024