Payment of slain medic’s salary ordered under Shuhada Package

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court has directed the provincial health department and Peshawar Lady Reading Hospital to provide salary of a doctor target-killed in 2013 to his family along with other benefits under the Shuhada Package.

A bench consisting of Chief Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth and Justice Abdul Shakoor issued the directives during hearing into the petition of Dr Shahnawaz Ali’s widow Sadiya Shahnawaz, who sought the court’s intervention to claim the payment of outstanding salaries of her husband along with other facilities under the Shuhada Package.

It also asked the health department and LRH, the largest public sector hospital of the capital city, to ensure payment of the slain doctor’s salaries pending since Feb 2013 and provision of educational and health facilities to his family members before the next hearing.

Dr Shahnawaz, an ophthalmologist and senior medical officer at the LRH, was killed by unidentified gunmen at his private clinic in Liaquat Street of Peshawar cantonment area on Feb 22, 2013.

The police suspected that the doctor was targeted by terrorists on sectarian grounds as he belonged to Shia sect.

Abdul Lateef Afridi, lawyer for the petitioner, contended that the deceased belonged to a noted Shia family of Peshawar and that his killing was an act of terrorism.

He said his client had been requesting the health department and LRH administration since 2015 for the release of salaries of her husband under the Shuhada Package but both had turned a deaf ear to her pleas.

The lawyer contended that under the Shuhada Package, the respondents were bound to provide the monthly salary of the deceased to his legal heirs, including widow and children, until the age of his superannuation in 2023.

He said under that package, the government had to provide educational and health facilities to the widow and children of the deceased besides offering a doctor’s job in the hospital to one of his children after qualification under the criteria.

Additional advocate general Rabnawaz and Khial Mohmand, the legal adviser to the LRH, appeared in the case and insisted that the respondents had finalised payment of the pending salaries to the petitioner.

Khial Mohmand said the Shuhada Package was provided to the legal heirs of the deceased in 2015 and only the payment of salaries and provision of other facilities had been pending.

Source: Dawn News