SC adjourns Sialkot jail hearing for Feb

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday adjourned the bail application of a jail superintendent accused in the killing of hostage judges at Sialkot prison and disposed of another petition wherein the interim bail granted to another accused had been challenged.

The case relates to the killing of four civil judges who were made hostages by the prisoners at Sialkot Jail on July 25, 2003. The captors demanded the release of some of their fellow prisoners. The administration resorted to a recovery operation and three judges, Sagheer Ahmed, Asif Mumtaz Cheema and Shahid Muneer Ranjha, were found killed while another judge, Sheharyar Bokhari, died in the hospital. The 17 accused were allegedly found involved in this incident and were granted interim bail by the High Court. However, Sikandar Hayat, jail superintendent, was denied bail and he had moved the Supreme Court. The court had already issued notice in this case.

On Tuesday, the Punjab assistant advocate general presented a report of the High Court chief justice which stated that the case of the accused on interim bail was fixed before the high court for Tuesday. The SC bench adjourned the bail application of Sikandar Hayat till the first week of February as it preferred to wait for the high court’s decision. Syed Ghulam Abbas Bokhari, father of deceased judge Sheharyar Bokhari, in his petition had requested that the interim bail case of police officers should be heard by the same bench which had rejected the bail application of Sikandar Hayat.

The report of the chief justice also stated that the bail case of other police officers had also been shifted to the bench consisting of Justice Khawaja Muhammad Sharif and Justice Chaudhry Iftikhar Hussain to fulfil the legal requirement. staff report

Home | National