Murdered men’s relatives reject ex-police officials’ claim

CHITRAL: The relatives of three men murdered in Osiak village in 2014 rejected the claim of two police investigators (now retired) that the recent sentencing of the murderers showed that their investigation was not faulty and they should be provided justice for departmental action taken against them when they were in service.

Speaking at a press conference here on Wednesday, Shaukatul Mulk, Shamsul Mulk, Mehmood Dastagir and Ziauddin rejected the claim of retired police inspector Rahim Gul and sub-inspector Sardar Wali and said they had not lodged the complaint with the district police officer (DPO) against any official but against the faulty and poor investigation in the triple murder case.

On Sept 10, the two retired police officials at a press conference complained that they had been punished for recovering arms used in the triple murder from the accused due to wrong information provided to the police authorities against them.

Now when a local court has handed down death sentence on five of the accused men, they (policemen) should be provided justice.

But the relatives of the three murdered men said credit to probe the case that led to the sentencing of the five men went to a team of officials from the police investigation branch who were sent to the area on the direction of higher police authorities. After conducting an inquiry afresh, this team of investigators had also recommended departmental action against the two local police officials (now retired) for faulty and poor investigation of the triple murder case.

They said that the two local police officials had also failed to record the statement of one of the three murdered men who remained alive after being shot and died many hours later.

They also said the two retired police officials had levelled an allegation against Zafar Hayat, the lawyer of the relatives of the victims, that he had colluded with the opposite party just to create misunderstanding between him and his clients. They said they had full confidence on the professional integrity of the lawyer. –S. Nazir Hussain  .