Sindh govt to seek judicial commission to review Mir Raza murder probe; family to move SHC against decision

The Sindh government said on Sunday it would be asking the chief justice of the provincial high court to establish a judicial commission to determine whether the investigation in the Mir Raza Ali murder case was being conducted impartially and in accordance with the law.

But, soon after the announcement, the counsel for Ali’s family raised objections and said they would approach the Sindh High Court on Monday against the decision.

The Sindh government’s decision came days after Ali’s parents approached Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, requesting that he directly supervise the investigation.

His parents, Mir Hussain and Mariam, wrote a letter to the Sindh chief minister through their lawyer Jibran Nasir, alleging that the investigation continued to suffer as the probe team “appears to focus on perpetuating the false narrative of the death of the deceased by suicide”.

A statement issued by the Sindh chief minister’s office on Sunday said their letter had been received with “compassion and the utmost seriousness”.

“After carefully considering the concerns expressed by the family, the government of Sindh has decided to request the honourable chief justice of the Sindh High Court to establish a judicial commission to conduct an impartial and transparent inquiry,” the statement said.

It added that the commission should determine whether the investigation in the case was being conducted impartially and in accordance with law. It should also identify any investigative angle or evidence requiring further investigation.

Moreover, the commission should determine whether “any police officer, medico-legal officer or other official committed negligence, dereliction of duty, professional misconduct, suppression or manipulation of evidence, or any unlawful act, omission or cover-up”.

The commission may recommend further investigation, forensic analysis and appropriate legal or departmental action wherever warranted, the statement said.

“For the effective discharge of its mandate, the commission shall exercise all powers available to it under the Sindh Tribunals of Inquiry Ordinance, 1969, including the powers of a civil court to summon and enforce the attendance of witnesses, examine them on oath, and require the discovery and production of documents and other records.

“All government departments, agencies and officials have been directed to extend full cooperation to the commission and provide every record, document and form of assistance sought by it. The Home Department shall provide the necessary secretariat support,” the statement read.

It added that the commission should submit its report, together with its findings and recommendations, to the Sindh government within 30 days of its constitution, or within such extended period as may be allowed where necessary for a complete and fair inquiry.

“The commission will be fully empowered to examine the conduct of the investigation and recommend appropriate action in accordance with law,” it said.

The government also expressed solidarity with Ali’s family in this time of grief.

Reacting to the provincial government’s decision, counsel for Ali’s family, Jibran Nasir, posted on X that they would move the Sindh High Court tomorrow to form a joint investigation team (JIT) and oppose the planned commission.

“Forming a judicial commission without informing the family of Mir Raza, nor making the terms of reference of the inquiry public. Why are other law enforcement agencies not engaged and a JIT [is not] formed? Why is the criminal conduct of police officers not investigated? Tomorrow, the family will move the high court for JIT and to oppose the judicial commission,” he wrote on X.

He pointed out that police were yet to submit an investigation report before the magistrate. “Before the submission of the police report, why has the Sindh govt announced a judicial commission? Is it because they know the outcome of the police investigation and they disagree with it?” he questioned.

In a video message, Ali’s family also rejected the Sindh government’s decision.

Sitting between her parents, his sister, Alishba, said they came to know about the Sindh government’s decision through the media.

Raising similar objections and questions as those by Nasir, she said: “On August 24, the police are to submit their report. But if there is no report yet, on what basis are they making this decision?”

“We, as a family, are not standing for this decision. We have been saying this since the beginning that we do not trust how the proceedings are going on,” she said.

She said they still had not received any response to their letter to the chief minister.

“We want more law enforcement and intel agencies to be a part of this; we want a JIT,” she said, adding that they would approach the court tomorrow (Monday).

She said the family had also sent a message to the Sindh home minister and asked him to provide a copy of the decision.

The case

Ali, a 25-year-old businessman and a graduate of the Institute of Business Administration, was found dead with a gunshot wound on July 29 in bushes in Karachi’s Gulistan-i-Jauhar a day after he was reported missing.

While his family was convinced that he was kidnapped, tortured and murdered, police were initially building the case around the possibility that he died by suicide.

A murder charge was eventually added to the first information report (FIR) after the exhumation and a second post-mortem of Ali’s body revealed that he had suffered multiple injuries and was shot in the back, ruling out the possibility of suicide.

The second autopsy was conducted after a controversy between the Karachi police surgeon and investigators over alleged loopholes in the medico-legal report regarding Ali’s first post-mortem examination.

On August 6, a judicial magistrate had allowed the exhumation of the body on an application filed by Ali’s father, directing the police surgeon and the Sindh health secretary to constitute a medical board for the exhumation.

The Sindh health department then constituted an eight-member board, with police surgeon Dr Sumaiyya Syed as the convener. However, in the early hours of August 7, the board was reconstituted through an order issued by the director general of the Sindh health department.

While Dr Syed remained the convener of the new five-member board, its members were changed.

But Ali’s family rejected the new board, which also resulted in the deferment of the planned exhumation on Friday. Meanwhile, the counsel for Ali’s family, Nasir accused the authorities of trying to bury the facts.

The Sindh government then restored the original medical board, following which Ali’s body was exhumed on August 8.

A day later, the Sindh inspector general of police’s (IG) office notified the reconstitution of the investigating team probing Ali’s death while Karachi Additional IG Azad Khan transferred the investigation into Ali’s murder to Zaman Town police station from Ferozabad Police Station, where the case was registered.

The same day, the Sindh government decided to seek a judicial commission for the case’s investigation, only to defer the plan a day later after Ali’s family said they had made no such demand and had faith in the new investigation team.

Letter to CM

But on Wednesday, they wrote to the Sindh chief minister, expressing dissatisfaction with the probe.

In their 22-page letter to Murad, which went into extensive detail about the incident and subsequent investigations, as well as the controversies surrounding the case, they stated that the “murderers and the conspirators of murder… despite public scrutiny continue to appear to exercise considerable political clout to ensure that the truth remains suppressed”.

The letter said that Raza’s parents “are horrified at the level of corruption, incompetence and political influence prevalent within Sindh Police”.

In the letter, Advocate Nasir, on behalf of the victim’s family, demanded the immediate suspension of police officers who were part of the original investigation team.

Referring to Sindh police’s statement on Tuesday that it had ruled out suicide following the second post-mortem examination of the body, the letter questioned “why the current investigation team continues to spend time and energy analysing and re-analysing these reports rather than focusing on securing and rationalising multiple other sources of evidence”.

The letter then listed 24 questions that remained unanswered in the investigation, including those concerning Raza’s communications shortly before his murder and the circumstances surrounding his death. It also raised questions about missing digital and forensic evidence.

The letter further pointed out that police had not answered questions concerning the alleged actions of Raza’s business partner in the days immediately before and after his murder.

“The police hierarchy has been reduced to a tool used to corrupt and later destroy the crime scene,” the letter alleged.

The previous investigation team’s conduct “attracts multiple penal offences under the Pakistan Penal Code”, the letter said, specifically mentioning Section 201, for “causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender”, and Section 218, relating to a “public servant framing incorrect record or writing with intent” to save someone from punishment.

The letter went on to propose 10 charges against the police officers concerned, including deliberate mishandling of material evidence, failure to record witness statements, deliberate manipulation of the investigation record, unlawful handling of the deceased’s devices, and “abuse of official position and concerted acts to defeat the course of investigation”, among others.

The letter also proposed 13 terms of reference for a departmental inquiry against the police officers, including an inquiry into “why the former investigation team prematurely adopted and promoted the theory of suicide” and “why the investigation team failed to respond to and heed the letter of the Police Surgeon Karachi”.

The letter also questioned why the special medical board had faced resistance and called for an examination into “the custody, handling and forensic examination of the deceased’s smartwatch”.

It further urged the departmental inquiry to “determine whether any senior police officer, public office-holder or other person improperly influenced, directed or pressured the former investigation team to adopt, maintain or promote the suicide narrative or otherwise interfere with the investigation”.

Additional input from Imtiaz