FAISALABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan has claimed that police did not shift a party supporter to hospital who died of rupture of appendix.
However, police said the man identified as Naubahar was a drug peddler and a heroin addict and was shifted to DHQ Hospital but he could not survive.
Naubahar of Chak 289-RB was allegedly involved in eight cases of narcotics and possession of illegal weapon registered with Dijkot, Thekariwala and Nawana Lahore police stations.
First case of narcotics was registered against him on March 6, 1990 with Dijkot police station and the last with the Thekariwala police on Oct 24, 2011.
DCO Noorul Amen Mengal had got him detained following a request sent by City Police Officer Sohail Habib Tajik on Aug 13.
The CPO through a letter titled “Request for issuance of detention order under section 3-MPO” sent to DCO stated the SHO Dijkot reported that Naubahar is an addict and sells narcotics to commoners. He is also involved in sale of narcotics in processions. He has also been involved in inciting people to violence to paralyse day to day functioning of the government. He is an anti-social element, therefore, his being at large is most likely to disturb the public peace.
Police say deceased was an addict and involved in eight cases
He requested the DCO to issue one-month detention order of Naubahar under 3-MPO West Pakistan 1960 to restrain him from wrong activities.
On Aug 16, he had fallen ill and was shifted to the emergency ward of DHQ Hospital, however, he could not survive and breathed his last the same day.
Family of Naubahar did not allow his postmortem examination.
On Aug 25, Special Judicial Magistrate Qaiser Javed had conducted a probe into his death and mentioned that his heirs in their statements said Naubahar had died of natural causes and they had no suspicion.
Irshad Ahmed, brother of Naubahar and two relatives namely Sharif and Shah Faisal had recorded their statements before the magistrate.
The death of Naubahar had infuriated Imran Khan who in his speech at Jhang some days back had threatened CPO Tajik and DCO Mengal to face consequences. He said names of both officers had been put on the PTI’s website and they would be taken to task when his party would come to power.
Sources said following the speech of Khan, police had initiated an inquiry to ascertain the political affiliation of Naubahar. However, it transpired with the help of statements of area people that he had no political association.
To a query as to why Naubahar being an addict had been detained, the CPO told Dawn that the district police had been detaining people having multiple FIRs of drugs and robberies. He said more than 30 people had been detained in a bid to get them out of circulation so that wrongdoings from society could be reduced.
