Daily Times

LAHORE: A full bench of the Lahore High Court on Tuesday deferred for a day the hearing of the Punjab government appeal against order of making public the inquiry report of Justice Ali Baqar Najfi into the 2014 Model Town tragedy. On Tuesday, counsel for the Punjab government Khawaja Haris advanced arguments on the appeal. The counsel for victims’ families also moved an application challenging the hiring of Khawaja Haris as a private counsel of the Punjab government. The counsel said that the respondents should also inform about reasons for hiring a private counsel by the Punjab government, when it had battery of law officers. The counsels of both sides came down hard on each other. Qaisar Iqbal and 19 other legal heirs of the victims of the Model Town incident were also present before the bench. Earlier, Khawaja Haris raised a number of objections on the single bench’s verdict. A single bench of Justice Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi on September 21 had ordered the Punjab home secretary to make public the Justice Najfi report and provide a copy of the same to the families of those killed and injured in the incident. The Punjab government had filed an appeal against the single bench’s verdict. Advocate Ali Zia also filed an appeal against the single bench order on behalf of the police officials by submitting that if the report was released, the police officials would be affected.

Published in Daily Times, October 11^th 2017.