BHAGAT SINGH CASE: PLEA IN PAK COURT FOR EARLY HEARING
Lahore: A fresh petition has been filed in the Lahore high court for the early hearing of a case to prove the innocence of legendary freedom fighter Bhagat Singh in the murder case of a British police officer, seven months after the court sought a larger bench to hear the plea.
The court has yet to form the larger bench. Advocate Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi of Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation has filed an application for early hearing of its petition. “I have filed the petition in the LCH for early hearing of the Bhagat Singh case. I have requested the registrar to get a date fixed for hearing of the case and hopefully the case will be heard this month,” Queshi said on Tuesday.
He said he has also written to the federal government for making statue of Bhagat Singh at Shadman Chowk (central part of Lahore) where he was hanged along with his two comrades. “I have written to the government for building a statue of Singh but has not yet got any response from it in this regard,” he added.
A division bench of the Lahore high court in February had requested the chief justice to constitute a larger bench to hear the petition seeking reopening of the case of Singh. In the petition, Qureshi had said Singh was a freedom fighter and fought for independence of undivided India.
Singh was hanged by British rulers on March 23, 1931 at the age of 23, after being tried under charges for hatching a conspiracy against the colonial government. The case was filed against Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru for allegedly killing British police officer John P Saunders.
In his petition, advocate Qureshi said Singh was initially jailed for life but later awarded death sentence in another “fabricated case”. He further said Singh is respected even today in the subcontinent not only by Sikhs but also Muslims as the founder of Pakistan Muhammad Ali Jinnah twice paid tribute to him.“It is a matter of national importance.” He prayed the court set aside the sentence of Singh by exercising principles of review.