Islamabad court sends Shahbaz Gill on two-day physical remand

An Islamabad court sent on Wednesday Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Shahbaz Gill on a two-day physical remand in a sedition case.

Additional Sessions Judge Zeba Chaudhry announced the court's reserved verdict pertaining to a petition seeking the physical remand of Gill.

On August 9, Gill was arrested by Islamabad Police outside Banigala Chowk on charges of “making statements against state institutions and inciting the people to rebellion.”

Islamabad Court approves judicial remand for Gill, rejects extension in physical remand

On Monday, the Islamabad court issued notices to Gill in the government’s petition seeking his physical remand.

A single-member bench of Acting Chief Justice Aamer Farooq on Monday heard the federal government’s petition filed through Advocate General Islamabad Jahangir Jadoon seeking physical custody of the PTI leader to collect additional evidence in the case and acquire the names of those behind the alleged offence.

Physical remand: IHC issues notices to Gill in govt petition

In the petition, the prosecution cited Gill, the sessions judge, Islamabad and the judicial magistrate as respondents. The government adopted the stance in the petition that the investigation was incomplete and Judicial Magistrate Umar Shabbir granted judicial remand and rejected an extension of Gill’s physical remand which has resulted in the prosecution case being subjected to “serious prejudice”.

It requested physical custody of the accused, arguing that the “police have yet to recover the mobile phone of the accused containing necessary information/date to corroborate the contents of FIR as a piece of evidence.”

Meanwhile, Punjab Home Minister Hashim Dogar said on Tuesday that Gill was not tortured during police custody.

Dogar said that he examined PTI Chairman Imran Khan’s chief of staff and was convinced he was not tortured.

“You can ask Gill about the torture yourself when he is released from the jail,” Dogar said in response to a question.

“I will share the details of my meeting with Gill in a meeting with Chairman Imran Khan,” he added.

Dogar’s statement comes days after Imran Khan and his party leaders claimed that Gill was tortured during the physical remand and that his medical report presented before the magistrate was fake.

“They are torturing and trying to mentally break him. And they are forcing him to give statements against Imran Khan,” the ex-premier alleged, adding that if “Imran has to say something, he will say it himself […] he doesn’t need Shahbaz Gill for that”.

However, a few hours later, the minister took a different stance and tweeted that he has recommended to the competent authority removal of DIG (Prisons) Rawalpindi Region Rana Abdul Rauf and Adiala Jail Superintendent Chaudhry Asghar for “illegally keeping Gill in a Chakki (cell) and subjecting him to torture.

Reacting to the development, PTI chief Imran Khan said he was "very concerned about Shahbaz Gill being sent into police remand again."

“He is in a fragile state of mental & physical health because of the torture inflicted on him when he was abducted & taken to undisclosed location & then again at the police station. This is part of a conspiracy to target me & PTI by forcibly getting false statements against us similar to what they have been doing against social media activists,” Khan said in a series of tweets.

He said it was unacceptable and announced to take all legal and political actions to counter such "extra-constitutional and extra-legal actions being devised against us."