IN THE SUPREME COURT OF PAKISTAN 
(Appellate Jurisdiction) 
 
PRESENT: 
Mr. Justice Asif Saeed Khan Khosa 
Mr. Justice Sardar Tariq Masood  
Mr. Justice Tariq Parvez 
 
 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
(Against the judgment dated 16.06.2010 passed by the Lahore 
High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi in Criminal Appeal No. 
424 of 2003)  
 
 
The State through Director General, Anti-Narcotics Force 
…Appellant 
 
 
 
 
 
versus 
Abdul Jabar alias Jabbara 
 
 
 
     …Respondent 
                  
 
 
For the appellant: 
Raja Inam Amin Minhas, Special 
Prosecutor, Anti-Narcotics Force 
Muhammad Tariq, Deputy Director, 
Anti-Narcotics Force 
Waseem Ahsan, Assistant Director, 
Anti-Narcotics Force 
 
For the respondent: 
 
Syed Zulfiqar Abbas Naqvi, ASC 
Mr. Arshad Ali Chaudhry, AOR 
 
On Court’s notice: 
Syed 
Nayyab 
Hussain 
Gardezi, 
Standing Counsel for the Federation 
 
Date of hearing: 
 
 
18.05.2016 
 
 
JUDGMENT 
 
Asif Saeed Khan Khosa, J.: 
 
Criminal Miscellaneous Application No. 819 of 2016 
 
 
This miscellaneous application is allowed and the documents 
appended therewith are permitted to be brought on the record of 
the main appeal. Disposed of.  
 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
 
2. 
Abdul Jabar alias Jabbara  respondent was tried by a 
learned Judge, Special Court (CNS), Rawalpindi on the allegation of 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
2 
having acquired and being in possession of assets derived from 
narcotic substances, etc. and after a full-dressed trial he was 
acquitted of the charge vide judgment dated 08.07.2003. The  
respondent’s acquittal was assailed by the State before the Lahore 
High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi through Criminal 
Appeal No. 424 of 2003 and the said appeal was dismissed by a 
learned Division Bench of the said Court vide judgment dated 
16.06.2010. Hence, the present appeal by leave of this Court 
granted on 28.04.2014. 
 
3. 
We have heard very detailed and elaborate arguments of the 
learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the relevant 
statutory provisions cited at the bar as well as the precedent cases 
referred to.  
 
4. 
While dismissing the appeal filed by the State against 
acquittal of the respondent by the trial court the learned Division 
Bench of the Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi 
had concluded that an appeal could not have been filed by the 
State against acquittal of the respondent recorded by the trial 
court under the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 and also 
that even if the appeal filed by the State was maintainable still 
such an appeal could not have been filed before the High Court by 
a Special Prosecutor unless he was authorized to do so by the 
Federal Government. As depicted by our interim order dated 
30.03.2016 essentially there are two questions involved in the 
present appeal and they are as follows: 
 
i) 
Whether the State can file an appeal against acquittal of 
an accused person in a case under the Control of Narcotic 
Substances Act, 1997? and 
 
ii) 
Whether a Special Prosecutor, Anti-Narcotics Force is 
competent to file an appeal before a High Court against 
acquittal of an accused person by a Special Court under 
the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997? 
 
The first question mentioned above has already been answered by 
this Court through the judgment rendered in the case of The State 
v. Mst. Fazeelat Bibi (PLD 2013 SC 361) but the second question 
abegs an answer in the absence of any authoritative judgment on 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
3 
that issue thus far. The learned Standing Counsel for the 
Federation of Pakistan and the learned Special Prosecutor, Anti-
Narcotics Force have assisted us on behalf of the appellant/State 
and have referred to various provisions of the Control of Narcotic 
Substances Act, 1997 as well as the Anti-Narcotics Force Act, 1997 
besides relying upon different notifications issued by the Federal 
Government from time to time for arguing that the State was quite 
competent to file an appeal against acquittal before the High Court 
and for doing that the Director-General, Anti-Narcotics Force had 
the requisite authority to require any official of the Force to file 
such an appeal on behalf of the State acting through the Director-
General. As against that the learned counsel for the respondent 
has 
vehemently 
maintained 
that 
the 
Control 
of 
Narcotic 
Substances Act, 1997 does not provide the procedure whereby an 
appeal is to be filed before a High Court on behalf of the State or 
the Director-General acting on behalf of the State and for that 
procedure one is to follow the provisions of section 417, Cr.P.C. 
and in that respect the provisions of section 10 of the Pakistan 
Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1958 may also be relevant. He has 
also highlighted that the appeal filed by the State before the High 
Court had been filed through the Force Commander, Regional 
Directorate, Anti-Narcotics Force, Rawalpindi and such Force 
Commander was not authorized by any law to act on behalf of the 
State for the purposes of filing an appeal. The learned counsel for 
the respondent has, thus, maintained that the impugned judgment 
passed by the High Court is legally correct and the same, therefore, 
does not warrant any interference by this Court.  
 
5. 
We must state at the outset that we have found the 
impugned judgment passed by the Lahore  High Court, Rawalpindi 
Bench, Rawalpindi to be nothing but a jumble of confusion and we 
have found it quite difficult to understand as to what was actually 
meant by the High Court vis-à-vis the issue regarding filing of an 
appeal against acquittal by the State before a High Court. We have 
found that the references in the impugned judgment to section 
417, Cr.P.C. and section 10 of the Pakistan Criminal Law 
Amendment Act, 1958 were totally unnecessary and were not even 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
4 
relevant to the controversy at hand because the provisions of the 
Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 and those of the Anti-
Narcotics Force Act, 1997 themselves provided a sufficient answer 
to the issues involved.  
 
6. 
Section 48 of the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 
provides a right of appeal against an order passed by a Special 
Court constituted under the said Act and it has already been 
clarified by this Court in the case of The State v. Mst. Fazeelat Bibi 
(PLD 2013 SC 361) that an appeal can competently be filed by the 
State against acquittal of an accused person by a Special Court. 
Subsection (1) of section 50 of the Control of Narcotic Substances 
Act, 1997 provides for appointment of a Special Prosecutor by the 
Federal Government who is competent to conduct proceedings 
under the said Act before a Special Court and, thus, an argument 
has been advanced before us that authority of a Special Prosecutor 
and his conduct of proceedings are restricted only to a Special 
Court and he can neither file an appeal nor can prosecute the 
same before an appellate court even if so directed by the State or 
the Director-General of the Anti-Narcotics Force. We have, 
however, found the said argument to be difficult to accept. 
Subsection (1) of section 71 of the Control of Narcotic Substances 
Act, 1997 clearly provides that the Federal Government may 
delegate all or any of its powers and functions under the said Act 
as it may deem necessary or expedient in favour of the Provincial 
Government, Director-General of the Anti-Narcotics Force or any 
other authority or officer of the Federal Government. The record 
produced before us shows that on 07.08.1997 the Federal 
Government had issued a notification whereby in exercise of its 
powers conferred by section 71 of the Control of Narcotic 
Substances Act, 1997 all the powers and functions of the Federal 
Government under the said Act had been delegated to the Director-
General, Anti-Narcotics Force. The record further shows that on 
19.11.2014 in pursuance of the provisions of subsection (1) of 
section 50 of the Control of Narcotic Substances Act, 1997 the 
Director-General, Anti-Narcotics Force had, in exercise of his 
powers conferred under section 71 of the said Act read with the 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
5 
Government 
of 
Pakistan 
Special 
Prosecutors 
(Terms 
and 
Conditions) Rules, 2013, not only appointed a Special Prosecutor 
but had also authorized him to conduct proceedings under the 
said Act for and on behalf of the Anti-Narcotics Force with effect 
from 17.10.2014. We have been informed that similar notifications 
have consistently been issued by the State regarding appointment 
and authorization of Special Prosecutors since the year 2001. The 
provisions of section 2(c) of the Anti-Narcotics Force Act, 1997 
define the “Force” as the Anti-Narcotics Force constituted under 
section 3 of the said Act and subsection (2) of section 3 of the said 
Act provides that the “Force” shall consist of a Director-General to 
be appointed by the Federal Government and such number of 
other officials as the Federal Government may, from time to time, 
appoint to be members of the Force. Section 5(a) of the Anti-
Narcotics Force Act, 1997 clearly and unambiguously provides that 
the functions of the “Force” shall be to inquire into, investigate and 
prosecute all offences relating to or connected with the various 
activities mentioned therein. It has already been held by this Court 
in the cases of Muhammad Hanif and others v. The State and others 
(2001 SCMR 84) and The State through Advocate-General, N-W.F.P., 
Peshawar v. Naeemullah Khan (2001 SCMR 1461) that an appeal 
in a criminal case is a continuation of the trial. We may add that in 
case an accused person is acquitted by a trial court then filing of 
an appeal against his acquittal may also be a step towards his 
prosecution. It is, thus, clear to us that filing of an appeal against 
the respondent’s acquittal in the present case fell within the 
functions of the Anti-Narcotics Force and such function could be 
exercised by the Director-General, Anti-Narcotics Force under the 
delegated authority of the Federal Government and for the 
purposes of filing of the appeal the Director-General could act 
through any of the officials of the Force. In the case in hand the 
right of appeal was that of the State/Federal Government and it is 
not disputed before us that at all stages of this case it was the 
State/Federal Government which was prosecuting the respondent 
before the trial court and had also filed an appeal before the High 
Court against the respondent’s acquittal. The legal position which 
emerges is that the State/Federal Government could competently 
Criminal Appeal No. 254 of 2014 
6 
file an appeal before the High Court; the Director-General, Anti-
Narcotics Force could act in the matter as a delegatee of the 
Federal Government; and the function of the Anti-Narcotics Force 
regarding filing of an appeal could competently be performed by 
any official of the Force, including a Special Prosecutor, as directed 
by the Director-General, Anti-Narcotics Force. In this view of the 
matter the whole controversy over the State and the Director-
General having acted in this case before the High Court through a 
Special Prosecutor has appeared to us to be making a fetish of 
technicalities which cannot be allowed to defeat the ends of justice 
if the jurisdictional competence is not doubted in the matter of 
filing of the appeal by the State/Federal Government or the 
Director-General, Anti-Narcotics Force. These observations made 
by us also take care of the argument addressed before us regarding 
the State acting in this case before the High Court through a Force 
Commander because it is not doubted that it was the State which 
had filed the appeal before the High Court and even before this 
Court it is the Special Prosecutor who is prosecuting the matter.  
 
7. 
For what has been discussed above this appeal is allowed, 
the impugned judgment passed by the Lahore High Court, 
Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi on 16.06.2010 is set aside and the 
matter is remanded to the said Court to decide Criminal Appeal 
No. 424 of 2003 afresh on its merits.  
 
  
Judge 
 
 
Judge 
 
 
Judge 
Islamabad 
18.05.2016 
Approved for reporting. 
  
Arif 
