Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi, the chairman of the Bhagat
Singh Memorial Foundation
in April 2014 registered
a FIR in Pakistan to prove innocence of the legendary freedom fighter, Bhagat
Singh in the murder case of the Lahore SSP, John P Saunders in 1928. Imtiaz
Rashid Qureshi has filed the petition seeking attested copy of the FIR
registered against Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru for allegedly killing the then SSP.
Following the petition the additional district and
session court of Lahore on 11 April 2014 ordered the police of Lahore to
provide a copy of the FIR to Qureshi. But the police refused to give a copy of
the FIR and following its refusal the court have issued a notice to Chaudhry
Shafiq, the Lahore Police chief regarding compliance of the court’s order.
As per Qureshi, the legal affairs office of the
Punjab Police has records from 1895 to 1928 but they failed to provide him the
FIR that was registered in 1928 at the time when the SSP was killed.
Recently, a petition was filed in the High Court of
Lahore by Quershi seeking reopening of the case of Bhagat Singh to establish
his innocence in the murder case. Following the petition, the Lahore’s High
Court has referred the case to the Chief Justice for constitution of a larger
bench.
As per Qureshi, the special judges of tribunal that
handled the case of Singh awarded a death sentence to him without hearing 450
witnesses of the case and even the lawyers of Singh were not allowed to
cross-question them.
Background
Following the order of the judges of tribunal after
the trial, Bhagat Singh, who were involved in the ‘Lahore conspiracy case’ were
hanged at Shadman Chowk by the British government at the age of 23.
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