A Karachi magistrate has acquitted Sharjeel Inam Memon, senior minister in Sindh, in the Sharjeel Memon liquor case, and has cleared five people charged with him. Judicial Magistrate South found that police and the prosecution had not proved the allegations, and that firm proof against the accused was missing. Those accused alongside him included household staff and jail officers.
His lawyers said the bottles police seized were filled with honey and olive oil. They argued that lab results and doctors' papers supported this, and that the contents were not liquor. The acquittal itself turned on weak evidence. The account of honey and olive oil was advanced by the defence.
What the magistrate decided
The ruling brings the prosecution to an end after eight years. To convict, the state had to show illegal possession of an intoxicant. The magistrate held that this had not been shown. With Sharjeel Memon acquitted, he and the five co-accused leave the case without a finding of guilt. ARY named the five co-accused as Mushtaq, Shukar Din, Muhammad Jan, Habibullah and Naseem Shuja.
From a hospital ward to a criminal charge
On 1 September 2018, Mian Saqib Nisar, at the time Pakistan's chief justice, walked unannounced into Ziauddin Hospital in Shirin Jinnah Colony in Karachi. Memon was admitted for care while he remained in judicial custody. His room had been set aside as a sub-jail, meaning the ward was treated as prison space.
During that inspection, Nisar said he had come upon three bottles of liquor in the room. Memon was afterwards moved to Karachi Central Jail. Officers of Boat Basin police then lodged a criminal case at Section 4 of Pakistan's 1979 prohibition law, formally the Hadd enforcement order, which deals with keeping intoxicants.
Across the hearings, counsel kept to the honey-and-olive-oil explanation and relied on forensic and medical papers. The magistrate did not issue a finding that those papers had reclassified the liquid. The file closed because proof was short of what the charge required.
Timeline: what has happened so far
- 1 September 2018: Mian Saqib Nisar, then Pakistan's chief justice, made an unannounced stop at Ziauddin Hospital in Shirin Jinnah Colony, where Memon was under care in a room designated a sub-jail.
- 1 September 2018: Nisar said three bottles of liquor were present in the room. That inspection is the starting point of the Sharjeel Memon liquor case.
- After 1 September 2018: Memon was moved to Karachi Central Jail. Officers of Boat Basin police filed a Section 4 case in the 1979 prohibition law covering intoxicants.
- Eight years on: Judicial Magistrate South acquitted Memon and the five people tried with him, because the charge was not proved.
Aasan alfaaz mein
Sharjeel Memon ko Karachi ki adalat ne sharab ke purane muqadme se bari kar diya hai. Unke sath paanch aur log bhi bari hue. Wakeelon ne kaha ke bottlon mein sharab nahi, shehad aur zaitoon ka tel tha. Adalat ka faisla yeh tha ke police apna ilzam sabit nahi kar saki.
