Al Wakeelo
Your Digital Lawyer, Always on Duty
Initializing Secure Chambers
Your Digital Lawyer, Always on Duty
Initializing Secure Chambers
Official Citation: 2025 SHC 1269
Court / Jurisdiction: Sindh High Court
Petitioner: Cr.Rev 133/2025 (D.B.) Sindh High Court, Karachi - ZAIN UL ABIDEEN S/O SHAKIR HUSSAIN (Applicant)
Ruling Summary: This decision was rendered by the Sindh High Court, officially reported as 2025 SHC 1269. In this matter between Cr.Rev 133/2025 (D.B.) Sindh High Court, Karachi - ZAIN UL ABIDEEN S/O SHAKIR HUSSAIN (Applicant) and the Respondent, the court adjudicated key questions of statutory construction, procedural regularity, and legal precedent under Pakistani law.
Core Holding: The honorable bench evaluated governing statutory provisions and judicial authorities to establish the rights of the parties, delivering the binding reasoning set out below.
COURT: Sindh High Court CASE NO: Cr.Rev 133/2025 (D.B.) Sindh High Court, Karachi CITATION: 2026 SHC KHI 1269 PARTIES: ZAIN UL ABIDEEN S/O SHAKIR HUSSAIN (Applicant) ORDER DATE: 04-MAY-26 BENCH: Hon'ble Mr. Justice Muhammad Iqbal Kalhoro, Senior Puisne Judge, Hon'ble Mr. Justice Khalid Hussain Shahani(Author) A.F.R: Yes ------------------------------------------------------------ IN THE HIGH COURT OF SINDH AT KARACHI
Before: Mr. Justice Muhammad Iqbal Kalhoro Mr. Justice Khalid Hussain Shahani
Criminal Revision Application No.132 of 2025
Applicant : Syed Mohsin Hussain son of S. Ashiq H. Zaidi, Through M/s. Sami Ahsan and Riaz Hussain Soomro Advocates
Criminal Revision Application No.133 of 2025
Applicant : Zain-ul-Abideen son of Shakir Hussain , Through M/s. Sami Ahsan and Riaz Hussain Soomro Advocates
Complainant : Hamadullah Farooqi son of Attaullah Siddiqui, Through Mr. Raja Hassan Nawaz, Advocate.
State : Through Mr. Ali Haider Saleem, Additional Prosecutor General Sindh.
Date of hearing : 22.04.2026
Date of order : 04.05.2026
O R D E R
KHALID HUSSAIN SHAHANI, J. --- By these two Criminal Revision Applications filed under Sections 439 and 435 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 read with Sections 16(5) and 18 of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, the Applicants Syed Mohsin Hussain and Syed Zain -ul-Abideen have assailed the consolidated impugned Judgment dated 15 -05-2025 passed by the learned VIth Anti -Terrorism Court, Karachi, whereby Syed Mohsin Hussain was convicted and sentenced to death under Sections 302(b) PPC and Section 7(1)(a) of the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, with c ompensation of Rs.2,000,000/- each in respect of the two deceased, and further sentenced to five (5) years' rigorous imprisonment with fine of Rs.50,000/ - under Section 23(1)(a) of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013; while Syed Zain -ul-Abideen was convicted and sent enced to Life Imprisonment under Sections 302(b) PPC and Section 7(1)(a) of the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, with compensation of Rs.2,000,000/ - each in respect of the two deceased, and further sentenced to five (5) years' rigorous imprisonment with fine of R s.50,000/- under Section 23(1)(a) of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, with benefit of Section
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 2 of 15
382-B Cr.P.C. Since both revision applications arise out of the same consolidated impugned Judgment, involve common questions of law, and seek substantially identical re lief, they are being decided through this common order.
2. Both Applicants have inter alia prayed for: (i) admission of the revisions; (ii) suspension of the impugned Judgment; (iii) release on bail pending hearing of the revision petitions; and (iv) ult imately, acquittal from all charges on merits.
3. We have heard the learned counsel for the Applicants, the learned counsel for the Complainant, and the learned Additional Prosecutor General for the State. Before adverting to any factual or legal controv ersy raised on the merits of the convictions, the appreciation of evidence, the acquittal of the co-accused, or the legality of the recovery under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, this Court is first obligated to examine a threshold question of jurisdiction , whether these revision applications are maintainable in law, or whether the High Court's revisional jurisdiction is barred by the special statutory scheme enacted under the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997. The issue is not merely procedural. It concerns the limits of jurisdiction of this Court when a judgment has been passed by an Anti -Terrorism Court under a special statute which provides its own appellate forum, prescribes its own limitation, constitutes a Special Bench of not less than two Judges, declares finality of judgments, and gives overriding effect to its provisions over all other laws including the Code of Criminal Procedure.
4. Before proceeding to examine the relevant statutory provisions, this Court finds it appropriate to crystallize the precise questi ons arising for determination, which are as follows:
(i) Whether a judgment passed by an Anti-Terrorism Court can be challenged through criminal revision under Sections 435 and 439 Cr.P.C.;
(ii) Whether the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 component of the convictio n can be separated from the consolidated ATC judgment and independently challenged by revision;
(iii) Whether the absence of a statutory appeal under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 creates revisional jurisdiction in this Court despite the self - contained appellate scheme of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997;
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 3 of 15
(iv) Whether Section 16(6) of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 preserves revisional jurisdiction against a conviction recorded by an Anti - Terrorism Court;
(v) Whether the pendency of statutory appeals under Section 25 A TA independently bars parallel revisional proceedings; and
(vi) Whether constitutional arguments regarding fair trial under Article 10A, the right to a remedy, or the vires of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 can confer jurisdiction upon this Court where the stat ute otherwise bars revision.
5. For the purpose of examining the foregoing questions, it is necessary to reproduce the relevant provisions of the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, namely Sections 25, 31 and 32, which must be read in conjunction with each other:
Section 25 — Appeal: (1) An appeal against the final judgment of an Anti-Terrorism Court shall lie to a High Court. (3) An appeal under subsection (1) may be preferred by a person sentenced by an Anti - Terrorism Court to a High Court within fifteen days of the passing of the sentence. (4) The Attorney General, Deputy Attorney General, Standing Counsel or an Advocate General or an Advocate of High Court or Supreme Court of Pakistan appointed as Public Prosecutor, Additional Public Prosecutor or Special Publi c Prosecutor may, on being directed by the Federal or a Provincial Government, file an appeal against an order of acquittal or a sentence passed by an Anti - Terrorism Court within thirty days of such order. (8) Pending the appeal, a High Court shall not rel ease the accused on bail. (9) For the purposes of hearing appeals under this section, each High Court shall establish a Special Bench or Benches consisting of not less than two Judges.
Section 31 — Finality of Judgment: A judgment or order passed or sentence awarded by a Special Court, subject to the result of an appeal under this Act, shall be final and shall not be called in question in any Court.
Section 32 — Overriding Effect of Act: (1) The provisions of this Act shall have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the Code or any other law but, save as expressly provided in this Act, the provisions of the Code shall, in so far as they are not inconsist ent with the provisions of the Act, apply to the proceedings before the Special Court.
6. The learned counsel for the Applicants, Mr. Sami Ahsan, Advocate, raised several points of law bearing upon the maintainability of the subject revision applications with considerable thoroughness. His principal contentions are that the instant revision applications were filed not against the convictions under the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, for which statutory appeals under Section 25 ATA (Cr. Anti -Terrorism Appeal Nos . 16 & 17 of
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 4 of 15
2025) have already been separately filed within the prescribed limitation period of fifteen days, but exclusively against the convictions and the impugned acquittals of co -accused under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013. He submitted that the Sindh Arm s Act, 2013 provides no avenue of appeal whatsoever against a conviction or acquittal arising out of an offence under Sections 23, 24, 24-A, 25 or 26 of that Act. Section 18 of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, he pointed out, only provides an appeal against admin istrative licensing authority decisions relating to refusal to grant, variation of conditions, suspension or revocation of a licence, while Section 16(5) empowers a convicting court to also suspend or revoke a licence, and Section 16(6) allows the High Cou rt in its revisional capacity to make such orders of suspension or revocation. The learned counsel thus argued that the only door left open by the legislature for a convicted person under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 is the revisional jurisdiction of the High Court, particularly when Section 16(6) itself acknowledges the High Court's revisional powers in express terms.
7. He further relied upon the well -entrenched principle of administration of justice reported as 2004 SCMR 612 1, urging that courts of law are duty- bound to ensure that no person is rendered remediless, and that if the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 provides no appeal against conviction under Sections 23 -26 and if revision is also held barred by the ATA's non -obstante clause, a convicted person would be le ft entirely without a legal remedy for the component of conviction referable to that provincial statute , a result repugnant to the spirit of the Constitution and to elementary norms of justice. He further submitted that the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 is a later enactment than the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, and that both statutes contain non -obstante clauses; that in terms of the canonical rules of statutory interpretation, generalia specialibus non derogant and lex posterior derogat priori, the later, more specifi c provincial statute must prevail, and that the ATA's non - obstante clause cannot operate to extinguish the revisional jurisdiction preserved by Section 16(6) of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013. He also pointed out that the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997 in its Section 2(g) defines "fire -arms" with reference to the Pakistan Arms Ordinance, 1965 only, and that no corresponding amendment was ever made to incorporate the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 in the definitional provision or in the Third Schedule of the ATA, resulting in a l egislative gap of significance; and relying on Section 36(2) of the ATA, which declares that a Special Court "shall be deemed to be a Court of ordinary criminal jurisdiction" for the purposes of any law referred to in
1 Jan Muhammad through Mubarik Ali and others v. Nazir Ahmad and others.
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 5 of 15
Section 36(1), he submitted that the A TC, while exercising jurisdiction over non-scheduled offences under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, must be treated as a court of ordinary criminal jurisdiction and the full panoply of the Cr.P.C., including revisional jurisdiction under Sections 435 and 439, wo uld therefore be available.
8. The learned counsel brought to the Court's attention reported judgments wherein this Court and superior courts have held that the High Court's revisional powers under Sections 435/439 Cr.P.C. survive despite express finality clauses in special statutes, including 1975 PCrLJ 195 (DB) 2, 1982 PCrLJ 779 (DB) 3, PLD 1996 Karachi 306 (DB) 4, PLD 2012 Sindh 119 (DB)5, PLD 2009 Karachi 7 (DB) 6, 1973 PCrLJ 755 (SB) 7, and 1968 PCrLJ 1416 (SB) 8. He also relied upon PLD 2016 SC 409 9 in support of the proposition that where a consolidated ATC judgment convicts an accused both under the ATA and under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, the remedy for the ATA component lies in a statutory appeal while the remedy for the Sindh Arms Act component indep endently lies in a criminal revision. He further relied upon the unreported Supreme Court judgment dated 29 -10-2019 in Criminal Appeals Nos. 403 -407 of 2019 (Syed Asif Hussain Zaidi & others v. Syed Muhammad Ahsan & others ) and the cases of PLD 2005 SC 173 10, 2005 SCMR 1785 11, 2005 PLC 364 12, PLD 1981 SC 553 13, and 1968 SCMR 57414, all establishing that a right of appeal is not a natural or inherent right but a substantive statutory right that cannot be assumed by implication or borrowed from general law when th e special statute is silent. In a broader constitutional submission, the learned counsel argued that the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 is void and ultra vires the Constitution for failing to provide any tier of appeal against conviction or acquittal under Sections 23-26, relying upon PLD 1988 SC 20215, PLD 1989 SC 616, and PLD 2006 SC 60217.
9. This Court has extended anxious and careful consideration to each of the foregoing submissions, which have been advanced with commendable
2 Ejaz Ali Shah and another v. The State. 3 Fida Muhammad and 3 others v. The State Bank of Pakistan and another 4 Haleem Shah v. The State. 5 The State v. Muhammad Arif. 6 Raza Khan v. The State and 2 others. 7 The State v. A. K. Muhammad Ali. 8 Abdullah v. The State. 9 Zahid Zaman Khan & others v. Khan Afsar & others. 10 Syed Masroor Shah and others v. The State. 11 Manzoor Ali and 39 others v. United Bank Limited through President. 12 Mughal Surgical (Pvt.) Ltd. and others v. Presiding Officer, Punjab Labour Court No.7 and others. 13 Pakistan International Airlines Corporation v. M/s. Pak Saaf Dry Cleaners . 14 Mst. Shohrat Bano v. Ismail, Dada Adam Soomar. 15 Federation of Pakistan and others v. Public at Large and others. 16 Pakistan through Secretary, Ministry of Defence v. The General Public. 17 Muhammad Mubeen-us-Salam & others v. Federation of Pakistan.
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 6 of 15
thoroughness and professional eruditi on. However, with utmost respect to the learned counsel and full appreciation of the ingenuity of the arguments raised, this Court is constrained to hold that none of the aforesaid contentions can overcome the fundamental jurisdictional bar erected by the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997 for the reasons that follow.
10. The Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997 is not merely a law that creates offences. It creates a distinct and comprehensive procedural regime for investigation, trial, judgment, appeal, finality, and execution . The plain and unambiguous reading of Section 31 of the Act makes it abundantly clear that a judgment, order, or sentence passed by an Anti -Terrorism Court is final and conclusive, subject only to the result of an appeal under the Act itself. The legislat ure has, with deliberate care, prescribed a self -contained and complete appellate mechanism under Section 25, restricting the mode of challenge against an ATC judgment to a statutory appeal before a Special Bench of the High Court, and to no other mode of proceedings whatsoever. It bears particular emphasis, however, that the jurisdictional bar arising in the present case does not rest upon a single finality clause taken in isolation. It arises from the cumulative statutory design of the Act read as a whole : Section 25 prescribes the specific appellate remedy; Section 25(9) mandates that such appeal be heard by a Special Bench of not less than two Judges; Section 31 declares the ATC judgment final subject only to the Section 25 appeal; and Section 32 gives t he Act overriding effect over the Code of Criminal Procedure and all other laws. When these four provisions are read together, as they must be , their combined and inescapable effect is that the remedy against a final judgment of an Anti -Terrorism Court is a statutory appeal under Section 25 ATA, and not a revision under Sections 435/439 Cr.P.C.
11. The question then squarely arises as to whether, in the face of this complete statutory scheme, the revisional jurisdiction of the High Court under Sections 435 and 439 Cr.P.C. can be invoked. The answer is an emphatic No. It is true that revisional jurisdiction of the High Court is supervisory in nature, and that exclusion of such jurisdiction is not to be lightly presumed. However, where a special statute provi des a complete appellate mechanism, declares finality subject to that mechanism, and gives overriding effect to its provisions, the exclusion of ordinary revisional jurisdiction follows by necessary implication. Section 32 of the ATA makes it lucid that th e provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure apply only to the extent they are not inconsistent with the provisions of the ATA. Sections 435 and 439 Cr.P.C., which confer revisional jurisdiction upon the High Court over
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 7 of 15
subordinate criminal courts, are p atently and directly inconsistent with Sections 25 and 31 of the ATA, which create an exclusive appellate pathway and declare the ATC judgment final subject only to that pathway. The revisional jurisdiction cannot, therefore, be called in aid to circumvent the bar so enacted. This view is fortified by the dictum of this Court in Criminal Revision Application No. 26 of 1999 and the reported judgment in 2000 PCrLJ 119518, wherein it was held in clear and unqualified terms: “Revisional or inherent jurisdiction of the High Court is not available to assail an order passed by a Special Court, and that Sections 25, 31 and 32 of the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997, read in conjunction with each other, do not permit the order passed by a Special Court to be challenged in re vision or under the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court.”
12. As regards the learned counsel's argument that the present revisions are directed solely against the convictions under the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 and not against the ATA convictions for which separate appeals are pending, this Court acknowledges the technical ingenuity of the submission. However, the argument fails to account for the fundamental reality that the impugned Judgment is a single, consolidated judgment passed by the learned VIth Anti- Terrorism Court, Karachi, as a Special Court under the ATA, and it is the judgment of that Special Court which is being assailed before this Court, regardless of the underlying offences it adjudicates upon. Section 31 of the ATA renders final "a ju dgment or order passed or sentence awarded by a Special Court"; the finality attaches to the instrument of adjudication, i.e., the Special Court's judgment as a whole, and not merely to those counts within it that are traceable to ATA offences. To accept t he learned counsel's argument would mean that any part of a consolidated ATC judgment relatable to a non-Scheduled offence could be attacked by revision while the rest could only be addressed in appeal , a result that would subvert the unified mechanism of Section 25 ATA and produce an impermissible bifurcation of the challenge to a single judicial instrument. Such fragmentation of one judicial determination would produce irremediable and intolerable anomalies in practice: (i) a Special Bench of two Judges w ould simultaneously co-exist with a Single Judge entertaining a criminal revision against the very same consolidated judgment; (ii) both proceedings would examine the same evidence, the same witnesses, and the same factual foundation; (iii) both may reach inconsistent findings on identical questions of fact and law; (iv) one forum may uphold while another may disbelieve the same recovery, the same prosecution witnesses, or the same common evidentiary basis; and (v) conflicting judicial determinations arisin g from the
18 Muhammad Sabir Roshan v. The State.
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 8 of 15
same consolidated judgment would embarrass the administration of justice and create irreconcilable confusion of jurisdiction. The law does not permit such fragmentation of a single judicial determination.
13. Before proceeding to address the r emaining submissions, it is necessary to deal with what may appear to be the most potent factual premise of the Applicants' case that they are rendered entirely remediless in respect of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 component of the impugned Judgment by reason of the absence of a statutory appeal under that Act. This Court is satisfied that this premise is factually and legally incorrect. The Applicants have already filed Criminal Anti -Terrorism Appeals Nos. 16 and 17 of 2025 under Section 25 ATA, which arise fr om the same consolidated impugned Judgment. The Special Bench constituted to hear those appeals is fully empowered to examine the legality, propriety, correctness, and sustainability of the entire judgment under appeal, and is not confined merely to those counts traceable to the ATA. The appellate court under Section 25 ATA does not examine a bare list of statutory provisions in isolation; it examines the judgment of the Special Court as a whole. Since the Sindh Arms Act conviction forms an integral and ins eparable part of that consolidated judgment, its correctness and legality can equally be tested before the Special Bench, which possesses ample jurisdiction to examine the legality of all findings recorded therein. Accordingly, the correct legal position i s not that the Applicants are remediless , it is that they have invoked an additional, impermissible, and parallel remedy through these revision applications. Their lawful remedy already subsists and is pending before the competent forum. The principle reco gnized in 2004 SCMR 612 19, that courts of law must ensure no person is rendered remediless, is accordingly not violated; the Applicants possess and have already exercised a complete, lawful, and efficacious statutory remedy before a competent appellate foru m. The invocation of that principle in support of these revision applications is therefore misconceived and cannot avail the Applicants.
14. Reliance on Section 16(6) of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013 is also misplaced. That provision recognizes the revisional power of the High Court in the limited and specific context of orders relating to suspension or revocation of a licence passed by a convicting court under Section 16(5). It cannot be expanded or extrapolated into a general appellate or revisional remedy a gainst every conviction under the Sindh Arms Act, particularly where the conviction forms part of a consolidated judgment passed by an
19 Jan Muhammad through Mubarik Ali and others v. Nazir Ahmad and others.
Cr. Rev. Appl Nos.132 & 133 of 2025 Page 9 of 15
Anti-Terrorism Court. Section 16(6) does not provide that a conviction by an Anti-Terrorism Court under Section 23 of the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, shall be revisable before the High Court notwithstanding Sections 25, 31 and 32 of the ATA. Nor does it contain any non -obstante clause overriding the ATA's special appellate regime. A general or incidental recognition of revisional authority in a provincial statute , confined to the narrow domain of licensing consequences, cannot be elevated into a jurisdictional foundation to defeat the express and self -contained mechanism provided under the federal Anti - Terrorism Act, 1997. The scop e of a statutory provision must be measured by its language and its evident legislative purpose; Section 16(6) was enacted to address licensing consequences flowing from a criminal conviction, not to create a parallel appellate avenue against the convictio n itself.
15. The contention that the Sindh Arms Act, 2013, being the later statute, must prevail over the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997 by reason of the lex posterior derogat priori rule is also untenable. The Sindh Arms Act, 2013 is a provincial statute enacted by the Sindh Legislature, while the ATA, 1997 is a Federal statute. The question of which statute prevails in case of inconsistency between a Federal law and a Provincial law is governed not by the lex posterior principle but by Article 143 of the Constitution of Pakistan, 1973, which expressly provides that a Federal law shall prevail over a Provincial law in case of repugnancy. The ATA is a Federal statute of superior applicability and cannot be overridden by a provincial enactment, regardless of the chronological sequence of their promulgation. The 2023 Amendment to the Sindh Arms Act introducing the reference to Section 11EE(2)(a) of the ATA, though not applicable to the Ap plicants' case of 2016, is itself illustrative of the provincial legislature's recognition and acceptance of the primacy of the federal ATA framework. Even setting aside Article 143 and proceeding purely on the plane of statutory interpretation, the result would be identical. The Sindh Arms Act, 2013 does not expressly provide that an ATC judgment in respect of a Sindh Arms Act offence shall be revisable notwithstanding the Anti -Terrorism Act, 1997. There is no later legislative command that…
Read the unabridged text and precedent citation network on Al Wakeelo Legal Research Platform.