Court orders Aamir Liaquat Hussain’s autopsy
A magistrate in Karachi on Saturday ordered the relevant authorities to carry out a post-mortem examination of the late lawmaker and television personality Aamir Liaquat Hussain who died on June 9 and was buried the following day.
In a copy of the order, the court magistrate (East) Wazeer Hussain Memon said, “It is clear that the cause of death of the deceased is still unclear which itself raised the matter of death, either it is natural or it is unnatural and can only be established after exhumation of the body and examination.”
He further wrote, “In the given facts and circumstances of the case at hand and particularly in light of guidelines set by honourable superior courts on the subject, I am of the considered view that disinterment of the body of deceased Dr. Aamir Liaquat Hussain is inevitable to determine the actual cause of his death in order to remove suspicions and clouds of doubt over his death.”
After Hussain’s sudden death, police said that an autopsy would be carried out, but the move was denied by his family and the police only conducted a preliminary review before relinquishing custody.
On Friday (yesterday), a citizen named Abdul Ahad had filed a petition to the court of the judicial magistrate (East) Wazeer Hussain Memon requesting Hussain’s autopsy, arguing that in light of previous “judgments rendered by superior courts, reasonable suspicion is considered sufficient to determine the actual cause of death of the deceased to exonerate the doubts”.
He added that the fact that the deceased’s heirs did not consent to an autopsy was not a “legal/valid reason to refuse the request” for a post-mortem examination.
The petitioner moved the court to hold “medical examination, disinterment, exhumation, and postmortem of the body of the deceased in the interests of justice and to discover and determine the actual/real cause of death of the deceased”.
He also asked that instructions be given to Sindh’s Director-General of Health to form medical advice for this purpose and send the Hussain samples to the Punjab Forensic Science Agency in Lahore for forensic examination and further testing.
The State, East district senior superintendent of police (SSP), and Brigade police station house officer (SHO) were nominated as respondents in the plea.
The court had set the plea for the hearing at 9:00 am today after issuing notices to the East District SSP, SHO Police Brigade, and Hussain’s family.
It reserved its ruling on the plea this morning after hearing the arguments of counsel for the defendants.
In presenting his arguments, Sajjad Ali Dashti, who represented the state, said that Hussain’s heirs were against his autopsy, saying that the conduct of the process would cause “pain to his soul”.
“The heirs also say they have no doubts about anyone” in relation to Hussain’s death, the lawyer added.
In addition, a police report submitted to the court said that according to the police surgeon, Hussain’s cause of death could not be ascertained until an “internal examination of the body has been performed”.
The written order issued later that day declared that while Hussain’s children were the guardians of his grave “when the death is suspicious and there are chances of commission of an offence or otherwise, then it is the basic scheme of criminal law that criminal machinery has to be set into motion to unearth fact behind the scene.”