Lahore HC orders quashing of two terror cases against Saeed

Police had booked him for allegedly inciting people to wage ‘jehad’ against infidels and seeking funds for the JuD during speeches he made in Faisalabad in August.

However,Justices Asif Saeed Khosa and Najamuz Zaman pointed out that since the JuD had not been included in the list of banned organisations under the first schedule of the Anti-Terrorism Act,Saeed could not be charged under the law. The court admitted Saeed’s petition and ordered the quashing of the two FIRs. During the hearing,the counsel for the Punjab government acknowledged that the JuD was not in the list of banned terrorist groups. He said the JuD was only included in the government’s watch list after the UN Security Council declared it a terrorist organisation last year.

Saeed’s lawyer A K Dogar told the court that his client was a “law-abiding” citizen. Neither Saeed nor the JuD is involved in any illegal activities,he claimed.

Saeed had also alleged in his petition that the two FIRs were registered against him due to pressure on Pakistan from India.

Saeed,also the founder of the banned Lashker-e-Taiba,was placed under house arrest in December last year after the UN Security Council imposed restrictions on the JuD. He was freed on the orders of the Lahore High Court in June. Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said on several occasions that the JuD had been banned,but official sources have said that no formal notification has been issued so far to proscribe the group.