Rai Tahir reinstated as AIG CTD

LAHORE: Rai Tahir has been re-appointed as Additional Inspector General (AIG) of Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), ARY News reported on Wednesday. 

He was sacked after Sahiwal shootout in which four people, including a couple and their teenage daughter were killed.

The reinstatement of Tahir comes in the light of the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) report’s findings into the incident.

On February 21, the JIT of Sahiwal police encounter incident in its final report had declared the deceased Khalil and his family members innocent.

However, sources said, the JIT report revealed that dozens of messages were found in Zeeshan’s phone establishing his contact with suspected criminals.

Zeeshan’s brother also confirmed about suspected people’s visiting their house, said the sources.

“The intelligence report was also about Zeeshan. While, Khalil’s family could have been saved, but the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) officials misused their authority,” they said.

Read more: LHC orders judicial inquiry into Sahiwal killings

The sources said all those six officials involved in firing were arrested, while no traces of firing from inside the car were found.

Khalil was killed along with his wife, daughter and another man Zeeshan in a shady encounter involving the Punjab police’s CTD on a highway in the Qadirabad area of Sahiwal district on January 19.

The Sahiwal incident sent shock waves across the country after one of the surviving children who witnessed the episode refuted the version of the CTD.