RAWALPINDI - A two-member bench of Lahore High Court (LHC), Rawalpindi bench, Tuesday issued notices to Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) investigators probing ephedrine quota scam to respond to the petition within two weeks, filed by an accused for quashing First Information Report (FIR) against him.
The LHC was approached by Director Biological and Director Health and OTC Products Drug Regulatory Authority, Ministry of Regulations and Services, Sheikh Ansar Ahmed with a petition for canceling of Ephedrine FIR against him.
The petitioner Sheikh Ansar, an accused in the case along with federal minister for textile industries Makhdoom Shahab-udDin and Ali Musa Gillani, an MNA from Multan, has urged on the LHC to quash the narcotics case against him penned in by ANF in October 2011.
“LHC Justice Muhammad Anwar-ul-Haq and Justice Chaudhry Muhammad Younis issued notices to the ANF investigation officers to respond to the petition within two weeks,” informed Advocate Abdul Rasheed Sheikh, representing the petitioner.
Citing regional director ANF Rawalpindi Brig Faheem, Deputy Director Abid Zulfiqar, Assistant Director Riaz Ali and head of the ANF police station Rawalpidni as respondents Ansar Ahmed who obtained post arrest bail on November 1, 2012 maintained that there was no evidence against him with the investigators.
Advocate Sheikh said that his client serving as Drug Controller Ministry of Health neither allocated 6000 kg Ephedrine quota to Berlex Pharmaceutical Multan nor allowed the conversion of 1000 kg quota for export into local consumption. Rather he put dissenting note on the file asking for conversion of the Ephedrine quota.
“When in 2010 the huge quotas were allocated by then Director General (DG) Health Dr Rasheed Jumma, Ansar was out of country and had nothing to do with the conversions as Drug Controller” Advocate added.
Arguing in favor of the petition advocate Abdul Rasheed Sheikh said the case of Section 9/C of Control of Narcotics Aubstance Act (CNSA) could be imposed against Sheikh Ansar as allocation of Ephedrine fall under the drug laws.
The defense lawyer, while citing different laboratory reports, said that the Ephedrine was not used as narcotics or used for preparing any narcotics.
ANF investigators first tried to force Sheikh Ansar to become prosecution witness against PPP MNA Syed Ali Musa and Makhdoom Shahab-ud-Din and during the interrogation he was pressurized to put his weight behind ANF, the lawyer of the petitioner added.
He said that ANF declared Ansar as accused when he refused to support the version of ANF, said Advocate adding that he was not named in the FIR, in the first two interim investigation reports.
In the Ephedrine scam, all accused in the case including the Chief Executives of the two Pharmaceutical Companies Berlix and Danas Islamabad had obtained bails from different courts of law in the case and final investigation report is still awaited by the trial court.