LAHORE: A larger bench of Lahore High Court (LHC) on Monday turned down the Punjab government’s request to grant an injunction, suspending a single bench’s verdict that directed it to make the Model Town inquiry report public.
A three-member bench comprising Justice Shehbaz Rizvi, Justice Amin-ud-din Khan and Justice Abid Aziz Sheikh took up the provincial government’s appeal against the release of Model Town inquiry report.
It issued notices to the PAT counsel and other parties involved to forward their arguments on the appeal in the next hearing on October 2.
Earlier, a three-judge bench of the LHC was dissolved after acting Chief Justice Yawar Ali recused himself from the bench formed to hear the Model Town case.
Subsequently, a three-member bench comprising Justice Shehbaz Rizvi, Justice Amin-ud-din Khan and Justice Abid Aziz Sheikh was formed to hear the provincial government appeal against the release of Model Town inquiry report.
On Saturday, the LHC had approved the provincial government’s intra-court appeal for hearing against release orders of the commission report by a single bench earlier this month.
Related: PAT chief calls for immediate release of Model Town incident inquiry report
The appeal stated that as the matter was under
review by a full bench of the high court, the decision of the single bench should be set aside, adding that the judicial report contained matters of national importance that could not be disclosed at the moment.Last week, State Minister for Interior Affairs Talal Chaudhry was opined that the commission report was compiled to score political points while claiming that the inquiry report has no legal value.
He said that the provincial government had already registered a FIR and the trial was underway, implying all necessary measures had already been taken with regard to the incident.
Read Also: PAT protests against non-release of Model Town inquiry report
On demand to the public the report, he claimed that there were several other commission reports which were never been released so far.
It merits to mention here that the LHC had announced its judgment on a petition filed by the PAT, ordering the provincial government to publish and public Justice Baqar Najafi Commission’s Report.
On July 17, 2014, 14 people were killed and 100 others injured when the police opened fire to scatter protesting PAT workers during an anti-encroachment operation outside the residence of PAT chief Dr. Tahirul Qadri.
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