The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Wednesday dismissed the appeal of a member of the banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) against his conviction in the 2005 Madinatul Ilm suicide bombing case and upheld his death sentence awarded to him by an anti-terrorism court.
An antiterrorism court had sentenced Syed Mohammad Tahseen, said to be an activist of the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, to death in March 2007 for his involvement in suicide bombing at an Imambargah in Gulshan-i-Iqbal in May 2005 which left three persons, including a policeman, dead and more than 20 others wounded. The trial court had acquitted co-accused Mohammad Altaf for lack of evidence.
One of the accused, Asif, was killed by the police when he arrived along with other co-accused for the attack, but the suicide bomber managed to enter the Imambargah in the neighbourhood’s Block 5 and blow himself up in the veranda during the Maghrib prayer.
The appellant’s counsel said the prosecution had failed to prove the charges against his client and he was falsely implicated by the police. He said the appellant was a passer-by and the police had implicated him in the crime to show its efficiency.
He said an identification parade was not conducted in accordance with the law and requested the court to set aside the conviction because the trial court had already acquitted a co-accused.
The deputy prosecutor general supported the prosecution’s case and said the prosecution had proved the charges against Tehseen, who was arrested red-handed from the site of the attack and a weapon was also found on him. The prosecution placed 32 witnesses, including three eyewitnesses, to prove the guilt.
However, the bench said that the case of co-accused was different from the convict since no recovery was made from him and the identification parade has already been discharged in this judgement and appeal against acquittal did not justify admission and was dismissed.
