Sessions Court Mirpur, on
Tuesday, was filled to capacity and yet there were others who were standing
outside taking turns to enter to get a sense of what was being said inside. This
was the second day of the final arguments in the famous murder trial of Mrs.
Najma Pirzada who was allegedly murdered by her trusted family driver, Tanvir
Bhatti, in March 2013, for cash and jewelry. This murder trial attracts unusual
pubic interest.
Mrs. Pirzada, wife of prominent physician, Dr. Pirzada GM Din, was a prominent
citizen of Mirpur in her own right. She came to Mirpur, in 1964, after her
marriage to what was then a young army officer, Capt. Dr Pirzada who later left
Army, established his practice in the town and became a house hold name. Najma
Ghani, as she was known before her marriage, was daughter of Mohd. Amin Ghani.
Gani Sahib hailed from Srinagar, and as "Lent Officer" from Pakistan Civil
Services, was then Accountant General, AJK and later served as Finance Secretary
Azad Kashmir and later as Joint Secretary, Ministry of Finance, Pakistan.
Najma's mother, Zubeida Gani, was first cousin of Ch. Ghulam Abbas,
Azad-Kashmir's first President and a close confidant of Mohd. Ali Jinnah.
Dr. Pirzada was Mirpur's first qualified and trained MBBS doctor; before him Dr.
Sarwar, a Bengali, Physician Assistant, (PA) from former East Pakistan, was the
only known doctor in town, but Sarwar was a diploma holder, LSMF and not MBBS.
Dr. Pirzada soon created a name for himself through his sincere hard work,
dedication to his patients and his professional integrity. By late sixties he
had developed a roaring practice in town and dominated the scene for next 40
years till his paralysis by a stroke, but he never added a pharmacy and lab to
his clinic. He used to say, that "a physician with a pharmacy and lab develops
his vested interests to sell medicines and order the tests offered by his lab".
He was the first one to break the old convention of examining woman only by
their "pulse". He convinced the public that a woman, like a man, cannot be
examined without a doctor putting a hand on her belly. First there was a furore
in the town, but he also kept woman's husband or a family member on the bed side
and soon public realized that he was right and medical examination of a woman is
incomplete without her abdominal examination.
But over the years, his wife, Najma Pirzada, created a profile of her own. She
took lead in creating a "Woman's Club" in Mirpur, and was deeply interested in
education of poor children.Today woman driving around in Mirpur is a common site
but Mrs Pirzada was amongst the first females to drive a car around. She was a
devoted wife who always waited for his husband on dinner table which was often
past mid-night and she was a dedicated teacher to her children; all of their
names found mention in the Honor Board in Mangla Cantt School; Moeed Pirzada is
a prominent TV Anchor and columnist, Dr. Aneela is a Medical Consultant, Baseer
is Director with a Texas based US conglomerate and Hadi who studied Hoteling
from Switzerland is now with Ritz Carlton in Dubai.
In the last two days of the final arguments, prosecutor Awais Bhatti and
prominent lawyer, Khalid Rasheed went over the record of evidences and reminded
the court that accused Tanveer was the only one with Mrs. Pirzada at the time of
her death, and had prevented her sons and daughter to talk to her on phone on
the strange plea that she is not well and does not want to talk to any one.
Family sources reveal that Tanvir was a day servant, who would in routine leave
by 4pm, but he volunteered to stay for nights persuading Mrs. Pirzada to let
other servant take a leave.
Khalid Rasheed told the court that Tanvir Bhatti did not let a close family
friend, Mrs. Raza, (mother of prominent politician Ejaz Raza) to see Mrs.
Pirzada. Mrs Raza had incidentally came to meet Mrs Pirzada in routine, around
12.30 mid day, but Tanveer Bhatti told her in strong words that "Mrs. Pirzada
does not want to see you". Court was informed that immediately afterwards,
around 1pm, Tanveer was captured on bank's CCTV footage cashing a cheque of Rs.
five lakhs, around 1pm, and that Rs. 5 lakh, in bank bundles and jewelry of Mrs.
Pirzada was later recovered by Police from Tanvir's home. Court was told that
FIA hand experts have verified that writing on the cheque was not of Mrs.
Pirzada but of Tanvir Bhatti. While throughout the proceedings, spread over last
4 years, Tanvir's lawyer kept arguing that Mrs.Pirzada was terribly sick and
died of her illness and that is why she was unable to talk to anyone even on
phone or meet her home visitor, Mrs.Raza, but Tanvir in his own testimony told
court that Mrs. Pirzada went along with him to the bank for cashing the cheque.
But all evidences, including CCTV, confirm that he was alone and when bank, as
per policy, tried to talk to Mrs. Pirzada to confirm her cheque, Tanvir let them
speak to a woman on his own cell phone. He later told the police that he had
fooled the bank officer by speaking in a woman's voice. Mrs. Pirzada was then
lying unconscious in home, struggling between life and death, while Tanvir was
cashing her Cheque. Prosecution reminded the court that while Tanvir's lawyer
kept arguing that Mrs. Pirzada was seriously ill, but at no point Tanvir
informed any doctors or family friend inside Mirpur to get help. Though given
Dr. Pirzada's medical links, every doctor in Mirpur was only a call away.
Prosecution cited from several witness accounts, of family and friends, that
Mrs. Pirzada was neither diabetic nor suffered from any known life threatening
illness. She was continuously in touch with her sons and daughter on phone,
email, Skype and text messages on daily basis, and sometimes many times a day
and the conversations were always about Dr. Pirzada's illness and treatment who
was then paralyzed since a stroke in Oct 2012. Mrs. Pirzada lead an active life,
driving herself around the town till one day before her death and entertained
family friends at her home in the evening before her mysterious death.
Murder case was investigated by SSP Irfan Saleem, then SP Investigations. Irfan
Saleem has created a name for resolving difficult cases. Accused, Tanvir Bhatti,
had told police, and later, in his Judicial Confession under Sec. 164, that he
had sedated Mrs. Pirzada by adding drug Xanax in her food and started injecting
her with Insulin from Dr. Pirzada's cabinet in the hope that she will die,
looking like a natural death but when Mrs Pirzada's son, Moeed Pirzada, rushing
from Lahore sent Dr. Zubair and Mrs. Zubair to inquire, she was semi-conscious
but still alive and fearing being caught he took a pillow and strangulated her
to death by pressing hard against her mouth and nose. She died after 4pm.
Post-mortem later showed injection sites on her left wrist, blood shots in her
eyes and wounds in her mouth, with her upper teeth puncturing and stuck inside
her upper lips. Forensic Report from Lahore later showed unusual levels of
insulin at the injection site despite the fact that post-mortem was done 9 days
after her death - when exhumation was done under court orders. Court learnt that
Tanvir knew about all these things because he was trained by Dr. Pirzada to
inject him insulin - and knew that insulin can cause death, but insulin
available at home was long acting, complicating Tanvir Bhatti's perfect murder
plan forcing him to resort to strangulation in the end.
This case attracts unusual public interest not only because of Pirzada family's
public profile but also because most families in Mirpur have their young members
living and working across UK and Europe and they employ trusted servants to be
with their families and elders and the nature of this murder creates panic waves
in public at large.