KARACHI, March 22: The former chief of National Development Finance Corporation, Wasim Mehdi, got his bail confirmed on Monday in the sum of one million rupees.
Wasim Mehdi is facing trial for advancing unsecured or inadequately secured loans to the Tawakkal Group of Industries. A loss of Rs100 million was allegedly caused to the corporation by the collusive loan transaction. The case was first assigned to a special court for offences in banks, which enlarged him on bail.
The case was later transferred to an accountability court in 2003, which issued him show-cause notice. The accused moved a petition through advocates M. Ashraf Kazi and Zubair Rajput against the notice in the high court. He was granted interim bail.
As the bail plea came up for confirmation on Monday, the lawyers submitted before a division bench comprising Justice Ghulam Nabi Soomro and Justice Sarmad Jalal Osmany that the accused had long been on trial and on bail.
However, they added, he had neither skipped the proceedings nor jumped the bail. They said that the case was registered in 1996 and had he not been granted bail, by now he might have remained behind bars longer than the jail term the offence allegedly committed by him was punishable with.
SHO SUMMONED: Justice Ghulam Rabbani summoned the SHO of Golarchi police station to answer an allegation that he was harassing a newly-married couple. Petitioners Shahnaz Perveen and Ghulam Shabbir Parhiar submitted through Advocate Ali Ahmad Junejo that they had to flee from their village in Golarchi, Badin, to contract marriage and lead a normal life like husband and wife.
The petitioners said that they wanted to marry each other, but, the father of Parveen was against the match and he wanted to marry her to an old co-villager only to prevent their marriage.
According to the couple, they somehow managed to come to Karachi and took up residence at Lea Market after solemnizing their marriage. Perveen's father, meanwhile, got a case registered against them and they were being pursued by the police at his behest. They were being harassed into dissolving their marriage to force Perveen to return to her father.
SHAISTA'S PLEA: Advocate Ghulam Qadir Jatoi has, meanwhile, filed a petition against the harassment of Shaista Almani's father and brothers. According to the petition, they were being harassed and taken into custody following the proceedings on a petition moved by certain non-governmental organizations on behalf of Shaista Almani and Balakhsher Maher.
Advocate Ghulam Qadir Jatoi said that his clients had no role in any matter related to the proceedings and even Shaista had made no allegation against anybody in her statements.
Meanwhile, the joint-petition moved by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, the Aurat Foundation and the Women's Action Forum is fixed before a division bench on March 26.
The court ordered the police for production of Balakhsher Maher on the date. He had not appeared before a court ever since he allegedly terminated his marriage with Shaista Almani by divorce.
CASE QUASHED: Justice Azizullah Memon allowed a petition moved by former PTCL director Kanji Mal and divisional engineer M. Abdur Rehman. Appearing for the petitioners, advocates M. Ilyas Khan, Ziaul Haq Makhdoom and Inam Nabi Soomro submitted that the PTCL officers had appeared as prosecution witnesses in a fake PCO case.
They had nothing to do with the bogus public call office and were asked (by the prosecution) to appear only as witnesses in the case. The advocates said that the two officers recorded their statements as witnesses to the best of their knowledge and belief.
However, they added, the special judge thought that they were supporting the defence and strengthening the case of the accused. Instead of the prosecution declaring the witnesses as hostile, the judge intervened to cite them as accused and prosecute them, they argued. They said the prosecution, pending since 1991, was wholly unwarranted. The proceedings against the two petitioners be quashed, they argued.
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