ISLAMABAD: The incarcerated founding Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan’s counsel Intezar Hussain Panjutha — who had gone missing on October 8 — was recovered by the Punjab police in wee hours of Sunday.
The Punjab police claimed of recovering Panjutha following a shootout with alleged kidnappers in Hassan Abdal.
The police said that Panjutha was recovered in the wee hours of Sunday when personnel of the Attock police stopped a suspicious vehicle during a routine check.
According to the police spokesman, the vehicle was carrying a gang of kidnappers with an abductee.
Upon being intercepted, the kidnappers opened indiscriminate fire on the police. However, they fled upon retaliation by the police party, leaving behind the car with a man trussed-up inside.
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The police safely recovered the abductee, who turned out to be the PTI founder’s counsel, the police spokesman confirmed.
Later, Panjutha was shifted to a hospital for medical treatment, where he revealed that he was severely tortured by the kidnappers. He said that he was picked up from Islamabad’s Club road on October 8 for a ransom worth Rs 20 million.
“The abductors were talking in Pashto and I was unable to understand the conversations. They kept me tied up till Saturday evening,” Panjutha said, recounting that he was being moved continuously for three to four hours.
“I had no idea where they had brought me or how far they had travelled,” he added.
The police said they an investigation is underway to identify the individuals behind the abduction.
The party labelled the development as scripted and demanded that a first information report (FIR) be filed against the Attorney General for Pakistan Mansoor Usman Awan, who claimed in the high court that Panjutha would be produced in court within 24 hours, suggesting he was aware of his whereabouts.
Video of him sitting in a car while being tied up was widely shared on social media by PTI, showing the lawyer visibly shaken and crying.
In a post on X, PTI chairman Gohar Khan questioned whether anyone would “ever take any such case to its logical conclusion”, adding, “You abduct, torture and then leave by the roadside and yet people say, thank God, he is back — no question asked.”
“Will any court ever hold anyone responsible or punish them for it,” Gohar said, adding that the recovery of Imran’s lawyer without any consequence for the abductors signified the downfall of human dignity and the rise of the “rule of might is right.”
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024