The Lahore High Court on Tuesday directed the interim Punjab government to ensure that contact is established between incarcerated PTI leader Hassaan Niazi and his father within a fortnight.

The order comes on a petition filed by Hassaan’s father, Hafeezullah Niazi, who petitioned the court to recover and allow a meeting with his son, who is in military custody.

Hassaan, a barrister and nephew of PTI chairman Imran Khan, was in hiding after the May 9 riots. He was arrested from Abbottabad on August 13 and handed over to the military for trial over his alleged involvement in the attack on the Lahore corps commander’s house.

On August 15, Hassaan’s father, Hafeezullah, filed a petition in the LHC seeking recovery of his son.

Two days later, a military official wrote to the police, requesting it to hand over Hassaan’s custody to the military for “trial by the court martial”.

Before the LHC began hearing the father’s plea, the police submitted a report in the court on August 18, detailing the offences in which the former was found to be allegedly involved.

The report was submitted by Punjab Additional Advocate General (AAG) Ghulam Sarwar while Justice Sultan Tanveer presided over the hearing.

The AAG informed the LHC in the hearing, “Hassaan Niazi has been handed over to the military”. He added that Hassaan was “named in the Jinnah House attack case and was a main suspect”.

The interim Punjab government told LHC in the hearing on August 26 that visiting a suspect in military custody was not allowed under any law.

Additional Advocate General Ghulam Sarwar Nahang stated in the hearing that the SC had already taken note of the trials of the May 9 suspects in military court and the question of the suspects’ meeting with family members was also pending before it.

He said proceedings in the high court on the same question of law would complicate the matter.

On September 28, barrister Faiz Ullah Khan Niazi submitted that 45 days have passed and since then the petitioner has been unaware of the whereabouts of his son.

In today’s hearing, a single-member bench comprising Justice Sultan Tanvir Ahmad ordered the Punjab government to establish contact between Hassaan and his father within a fortnight.

According to the written order, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com, the petitioner’s lawyer told the court his client would be satisfied if he was allowed to establish contact with his son.

According to the order, the government officials maintained that since the matter is still pending adjudication before the apex court, it is “in the fitness of the circumstances to adjourn the case till the decision is passed by the Supreme Court”.

Pakistan’s star javelin thrower Arshad Nadeem was on Tuesday ruled out of the Asian Games, under way in the Chinese city of Hangzhou, due to a chronic knee injury, the athlete confirmed to Dawn.com.

Nadeem, a trailblazer and beacon of hope for the future of athletics in the country, won silver at the World Athletics Championship in Budapest earlier this year.

However, in a big blow for his fans, the athlete dropped out of the Asian Games just a day before the tournament’s Men’s Javelin Throw final, scheduled for Wednesday.

According to a statement issued by Pakistan’s Chef de Mission at the Asian Games, Nadeem had complained of “persistent pain for several weeks” at the first training session in Hangzhou on Sept 27.

It said the concern had become particularly pressing in the aftermath of the World Athletics Championship.

“On Oct 2, he again complained of pain in the right knee and express a desire to undergo an evaluation to determine the impact on his ability to participate in the Javelin Throw event at the Asian Games,” the statement said.

Subsequently, the Pakistan contingent’s chief medical officer recommended a comprehensive check-up of Nadeem who then underwent a thorough examination, including a non-invasive test i.e. MRI at a local
hospital here in Hangzhou.

“After consulting the medical personnel, Nadeem has now decided not to participate in the Asian Games in order to prevent any untoward situation that may hinder his training program and participation in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games,” the statement concluded.

• Originally a plastic surgeon at LGH, Mumtaz conducted illegal operations in private residences
• Officials say surgeries have claimed lives of several patients including foreign nationals

LAHORE: Notorious illegal kidney transplant surgeon Fawad Mumtaz, who was re-arrested a couple of days ago by Lahore police after he escaped from custody, has become a ‘test case’ for the criminal justice system and the law enforcement agencies, especially for the Punjab police.

Mumtaz has been booked and arrested several times by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and Pu­­­n­jab police, but each time, he has managed to obtain bail and con­­tinued his illegal transplant racket.

According to his criminal record, Mumtaz has been running the largest-ever illegal kidney transplant racket across the country, especially in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Azad Jammu and Kashmir since 2009.

An official said that Mumtaz was originally a plastic surgeon at the state-run Lahore General Hospital. He was serving as an assistant professor when he was first suspended from service for conducting illegal transplant procedures.

The rogue surgeon has reportedly become a billionaire, exploiting rich clients and charging exorbitant amounts from clients — especially those from Gulf countries — to perform illegal transplant operations.

According to FIA and police in­­vestigations, Mumtaz would char­­ge Rs10 million to Rs15 million from foreign clients/patients for each illegal kidney transplant and used to pay Rs100,000 to Rs150,000 to local donors, who his gang members would trap with the promise of employment or other lures.

The rogue surgeon would conduct the illegal transplant procedures in rented houses in private housing societies in cities across the province, it has emerged.

A few days ago, Lahore police picked him up from Taxila in connection with a case registered against him at Garden Town police station.

But shockingly, Mumtaz managed to flee from police custody, and the official explanation provided was that four of his armed accomplices attacked the police team and managed to free him.

The incident prompted careta­ker Punjab chief minister Mohsin Naqvi to hold a press conference.

He told journalists on Sunday that Mumtaz has been re-arrested by Lahore police and action has been proposed against police officers who had taken him into custody before he managed to escape.

Lahore DIG Investigation Imran Kishwar told Dawn the accused was on physical remand and police were interrogating him. He said the officials responsible for his escape had been suspended from service and a departmental inquiry has been launched to punish them accordingly.

An official told Dawn that Mumtaz had a notorious criminal record spanning over a decade.

Currently, several cases are lodged against him in Lahore, Multan, Okara, Bahawalpur, Fai­salabad, Taxila and Rawalpindi.

The last case against him was registered in Taxila, where a joint team of the Punjab Human Organ Transplant Authority and local police arrested six suspects, including doctors and paramedics, during a raid in March.

Talking about illegal renal transplant procedures, the official said that Mumtaz had performed a kidney transplant on the daughter of famous comedian Umar Sharif in Azad Jammu and Kashmir in February 2020.

During the procedure, she developed serious complications and was brought to hospital in Lahore, where she breathed her last, the official said, adding that Mumtaz received Rs3.5 million from the family to perform the illegal transplant in AJK because there were no laws to prevent illegal human organ transplants in that territory.

FIA teams had also failed to arrest Mumtaz during an earlier raid on his residence in Lahore, and consequently, the rogue surgeon had managed to go into hiding. He was arrested by FIA in April 2017, when he had carried out illegal transplant procedures on Jordanian, Libyan and Omani nationals at EME Society in Lahore for Rs6m each.

Later, FIA revealed that a Jordanian national had died during the illegal procedure.

The deceased woman’s death certificate was faked by one of Mumtaz’s accomplices, Dr Altamash Kharal, and the body was kept in another private hospital in Defence before being sent back to Jordan. At the time, FIA had recommended action against Mumtaz and his accomplices.

Published in Dawn, October 3rd, 2023