Islamabad - Special Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) Islamabad yesterday declared Tehreek-e-Labbaik-Ya Rasool Allah (TLYRA) leader Khadim Hussain Rizvi, Afzal Qadri and others as proclaimed offenders in the Faizabad sit-in case.
The ATC judge Shahrukh Arjumand conducted hearing of the case and declared them proclaimed offenders for continuous non-appearance of Khadim Rizvi, Pir Afzal Qadri Qadri, Maulana Inayat and Sheikh Izhar. In this matter, police also submitted a report stating that police had pasted posters of summoning Khadim Rizvi and others at Police Station Nawa Kot in Lahore, his Madrassa office and outside the concerned court.
During the hearing, public prosecutor informed the court that despite service of various summons, the clerics did not appear before the court. He said that the police could not execute the arrest warrants since the whereabouts of these clerics were not known.
It was March 6 when the ATC had declared Rizvi as well as other leaders of TLYRA as absconders and initiated the process to declare them as proclaimed offenders under Section 87 (absconding) over their continuous failure to appear before the court.
On November 6, 2017, workers of TLYR and activists of other religious groups staged a sit-in at the Faizabad Interchange in Islamabad against the amendments in the declarations of elected representatives, virtually paralyzing the twin cities for more than two weeks.
Later, police and Frontier Constabulary (FC) personnel had launched an operation against the protesters after the high court had ordered the clearance of the bridge that connects the federal capital with Rawalpindi.
Later, the TLYR workers left the after striking an agreement with the government.