Zia Ul Haq case: Lack of evidence dents trial

Hyderabad: It has become commonplace for suspects arrested and chargesheeted in major cases by the city police and the National Investigation Agency from Hyderabad to be acquitted by the courts.

Investigation agencies often can’t furnish evidence during the trial and the prosecution fails to get a conviction. After the Mecca Masjid blasts case took a complete U turn with all the youngsters arrested being acquitted by the court, two youngsters were acquitted in the case of attacking the  Gujarat police. Now, Zia Ul Haq has been acquitted in the Odeon theatre blast case.

Human rights activists say that when investigation agencies proceed with communal biases, such failure is inevitable. However, the prosecution and the police say that sometimes the unavailability of crime scene evidences and witnesses lead to this situation. The prosecution sometimes fail to link the available evidences with the offence because of various reasons, say senior police officials.

Advocate and civil liberties activist V Raghunath said, “Some of those cases were politically motivated to show a particular community as terrorists, and investigation agencies failed to produce evidence for the charges they framed. The government should look into these aspects,” he said.

Prominent advocates say that proceeding with weak evidences on major cases is a waste of time and resources of the judiciary. Senior advocate and human rights activist Shafeeq-ur-Rahman Muhajir said that it is not just one acquittal, but a series of acquittals that are being seen. “The investigation agencies and public prosecution are equally responsible for framing charges when the evidences are not enough to sustain the allegations. They are wasting the time and resources of the judiciary,” he said.

Meanwhile, senior police officials from the city say that it does not necessarily prove that the allegations are false or concocted. “When the cases are detected and the accused is arrested many years after the case, it’s not easy to access crime scene evidences. It’s also very difficult to link the available evidences with the offence and the offender. When the evidences are not convincing enough, the framed charges are not approved by the court,” said a senior police official from Hyderabad police.

Officials said that in the Zia Ul Haq case, the Hyderabad police and prosecution would study the judgment and analyse on what grounds the acquittal had been granted. “We will seek legal opinion and will decide whether we should proceed to the higher court with an appeal,” a police official said.