SARDAR TARIO MASOOD, J.---The petitioner Lal Jan has impugned the judgment dated 18.07.2019 of the Peshawar High Court, Peshawar, whereby appeal filed by the petitioner was dismissed.
2. Precise facts of the case are that the petitioner was booked in case FIR No.180 dated 03.07.2015, registered at Police Station Uterzai Kohat, under section 9(c) of the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 (the Act). After a full-fledged trial, vide judgment dated 09.11.2017, he was convicted under section 9(c) of the Act and sentenced to undergo simple imprisonment for a period of 25 years (life imprisonment) with fine of Rs.3,00,000/- or in default thereof to further undergo S.I. for six months.
Benefit of section 382-B of the Code of Criminal Procedure was also extended to him: Appeal filed by the petitioner before the High Court was dismissed by means of impugned judgment; hence, this petition for leave to appeal.
3. We have heard the learned counsel for both sides and without touching the merits of the case, at the very outset, observed that the recovery was effected on 03.07.2015 whereas the sample parcels were received in the office of Forensic Science Laboratory, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on 15.07.2015 through Arshad Haroon, Constable-32, but the said constable was never produced by the prosecution to establish the safe transmission of the sample parcels to the concerned laboratory story and there is no explanation as to why his evidence was withheld. Even today learned counsel for the State could not offer any plausible explanation to this extent. This Court in the cases of Qaiser Khan v. The State through Advocate-General, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Peshawar (2021 SCMR 363), Mst. Razia Sultana v. The State and another (2019 SCMR 1300), The State through Regional Director ANF v. Imam Bakhsh and others (2018 SCMR 2039), Ikramullah and others v.
The State (2015 SCMR 1002) and Amjad Ali v. The State (2012 SCMR 577) has held that in a case containing the above mentioned defect on the part of the prosecution it cannot be held with any degree of certainty that the prosecution had succeeded in establishing its case against an accused person beyond any reasonable doubt.
4. For the forgoing reasons, this petition is converted into an appeal and the same is allowed. The impugned judgment is set aside and the appellant Lal Jan, while giving him the benefit of doubt, is acquitted of the charge in the instant case. He be released from jail forthwith, if not required to be detained in connection with any other case.