Allegations over agriculture land: Daniyal announces legal battle against Akbar

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Daniyal Aziz Thursday announced a legal battle in the criminal jurisdiction against Adviser to Prime Minister on Accountability Shahzad Akbar over alleged “baseless” allegations with regard to his father’s agriculture land.

Speaking at a news conference, Aziz said he would “drag” Akbar to a criminal court and would fight a legal battle against him for levelling “baseless” allegations against him by linking his father’s agriculture land with him.

“I have held several high-ranking official positions, and the entire Pakistan knows me. No one knew who you are and why are you ruining the lives of innocent and respectable people?...I will drag you in the court, then will you understand that even innocent people know how to fight back,” Daniyal Aziz added.

Referring to a recent presser by Shahzad Akbar, he said the adviser levelled allegations against several people, including him, adding the handout distributed during the presser mentioned his father’s name wrong as “Mohammad Aziz” instead of Anwer Aziz.

He said the adviser claimed that the government had retrieved land worth Rs2,500 million from him, adding he had no connection with the land mentioned in the handout.

He said Shahzad Akbar had claimed that the “illegally occupied” state land measuring 2,400 kanal in Chak No 17, 172 North branch, Sargodha, worth Rs2.5 billion had been retrieved from him.

“But the fact of the matter is that I don’t have any connection with this land. It was given to my father in 1961 before my birth under a scheme by the Punjab government where the non-fertile lands were given to hundreds of people for cultivation on the same terms was given to my father,” he claimed.

He said his father fought a legal battle of possession of the land against the Punjab government when he was alive and had won the case.

The PML-N leader also shared with the media what he described as a court order against Anti-Corruption Department of Punjab, adding the court had stopped the authorities from interfering with the possession of the land.

Before his criticism on the adviser, Daniyal Aziz also lashed out at the PTI government and its slogan of creating a state on the pattern of the State of Madina [Riasat-e-Madina], saying those who were giving example of the Islamic state had resorted to levelling baseless allegations against respectable people including those who had passed away.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021