Pak SC dismisses Sarabjit's plea; Zardari to decide his fate

Rezaul H Laskar

Islamabad, Jun 24 (PTI) The fate of Indian prisoner
Sarabjit Singh hung by a slender thread as Pakistan's Supreme
Court Wednesday dismissed his review petition challenging the
death sentence handed out to him in 1991, leaving him at the
mercy of a presidential pardon by Asif Ali Zardari.

Sarabjit's conviction for alleged involvement in four
bomb blasts in 1990 that killed 14 people in Pakistan by an
anti-terrorism court in 1991 was upheld by a three-member
Supreme Court bench led by Justice Raja Fayyaz Ahmed.

The bench dismissed 43-year-old Sarabjit's review
petition after his counsel again failed to appear in the court
and he was convicted as there was nobody to defend him.

Sarabjit's counsel had failed to appear in the court
for the past few hearings, including the last one on Monday.

Rana Abdul Hamid, the lawyer who was representing
Sarabjit, told reporters after the verdict, "I cannot be
present in the court as I'm a government lawyer".

"Other lawyer, who was to represent him, was in some
other court and before he could have reached there the
petition was dismissed," said Hamid.

The sole hope left for Sarabjit, whose trial evoked
much public and media hype on both sides of the border, is a
pardon by President Zardari.

His review mercy petition is now pending in the
President's office.

"I cannot really comment on this now," Presidential
spokesman Farhattullah Babar said when asked to comment on the
court order.

Sarabjit's lawyer Hamid said he had been unable to
appear in the court after he was last year appointed an
additional advocate general by Punjab government.

Sarabjit was set to be hanged on April one last year
though Pakistani authorities put off his execution
indefinitely after Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani
intervened in the matter.

Following an appeal by Sarabjit, the Lahore High Court
had upheld his death sentence in 2003. The apex court too had
upheld his death sentence in August 2005. Former President
Pervez Musharraf dismissed Sarabjit's mercy petition last
year.

Sarabjit's execution was initially deferred for 30
days by Musharraf last year. This was done so that the
Pakistan People's Party-led government, which had just assumed
power at the time, could review his case following India's
appeal for clemency.

In October last year, then Law Minister Farooq Naek
met Sarabjit at Kot Lakhpat jail in Lahore to examine his case
so that President Zardari could decide whether to pardon him.
There has been no movement in this matter since then.

Naek, who is now Chairman of the Senate or upper house
of parliament, had pointed out that only the President had the
powers to pardon or remit Sarabjit's sentence as his mercy
petition had been dismissed by the Supreme Court.