Pak lawyer seeks to prove Bhagat Singh’s innocence
Eighty-six years after Bhagat Singh was hanged for the murder of a British police officer, a Pakistani lawyer is fighting to prove the freedom fighter’s innocence in a Lahore court.
Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi on Monday filed a fresh petition in the Lahore high court for the early hearing of his case to prove Singh’s innocence. The court had in February 2016 asked the Pakistan chief justice to constitute a larger bench to hear the petition by Qureshi, who runs the Lahorebased Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation.
However, no action has been taken yet.
In his petition, Qureshi said Singh was a freedom fighter and fought for the independence of undivided India.
Many Pakistanis, especially in the Lahore area, consider Singh a hero. Qureshi said Singh is respected in the subcontinent by both Indians and Pakistanis, adding that even the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, had twice paid tribute to him.
His petition wants the court to set Singh’s sentence by exercising the principles of review and order the government to honour him with a state award.
Singh was hanged by the British on March 23, 1931 in Lahore after being charged with 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.
Qureshi said he hopes the case will be heard this month. He said he has also written to the federal government for erecting a statue of Singh at Shadman Chowk in central Lahore, where the three freedom fighters were hanged.
In 2014, Lahore police searched through records of the Anarkali police station and found the FIR on Saunders’ murder in 1928. A copy of the FIR was provided to Qureshi on the court’s order.
Written in Urdu, the FIR was registered on December 17, 1928 at 4.30 pm against two “unknown gunmen”. The case was registered under Sections 302, 1201 and 109 of the Indian Penal Code. Singh’s name was not mentioned in the FIR, though he was eventually given the death sentence for the murder.