IK’s non-bailable arrest warrants in Toshakhana case upheld

ISLAMABAD: A district and sessions court, on Monday, rejected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman and former premier Imran’s exemption application and upheld the non-bailable arrest warrants issued for him in the Toshakhana case over his persistent absence in the case hearings.

Additional District and Sessions Judge Zafar Iqbal, while announcing its reserved judgment, rejected the PTI chief’s exemption application and upheld arrest warrant issued for him.

The court issued directives to present former premier Khan before it on March 18.

At the start of the hearing, the PTI chairman’s lawyer, Khawaja Haris, filed an application seeking exemption from personal appearance citing security threats. Haris also filed another plea seeking to declare the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP)’s complaint against the PTI chief as “non-maintainable”.

Haris, while arguing before the court, said his client was not deliberately avoiding appearing before the court.

He was facing serious security threats, Haris argued.

He said “we have filed petitions at the Islamabad High Court (IHC) and the Lahore High Court (LHC).”

The court had to look into the legal aspect of the case, he said.

He requested the court that before issuing an arrest warrant, it should be decided whether the complaint is admissible or not.

Khan’s lawyer further said the complainant was not a district election commissioner.

The complaint had not been filed by the competent authority, he said, adding the signature of the complainant was present on the last page of the complaint.

“There was no need for an affidavit when lodging a complaint against Khan and the complainant had different signatures on the affidavit and the statement,” Haris said, adding the signature should be examined by a handwriting expert.

Haris said that a complaint against the corrupt practice and criminal proceedings could have been lodged within 120 days as per the Election Act, 2017, but in this case, it was filed after three years. The IHC had suspended the warrant till today and was directed to continue the proceedings as per the law. He requested the court to decide whether the case was admissible or not before further proceedings.

Saad Hasan, counsel for the ECP while arguing before the court said the arrest warrant issued for Khan was still on-field and the IHC had rejected Khan’s plea for cancellation of an arrest warrant. The IHC suspended the order for a few days to appear before the court, he said. “If the court thinks that the complaint is inadmissible then there is no issue in that,” he added.

Hasan said “the IHC’s suspension of the warrant expired today”, adding “the high court had directed Khan to appear before the court today.”

Haris said there was no reason to take criminal action against the former prime minister. The ECP needed to present arguments about the admissibility of the complaint, he said.

The ECP’s counsel said Khan deliberately delayed the case and requested the court to reject Khan’s exemption application. Another lawyer Amjad Pervaiz, while arguing before the court, said that everyone in the country had security threats but court proceedings could not be stopped due to this reason. The PTI chief did not have concrete reasons for not appearing before the court, he said.

He said the court granted relief to Khan several times but he only “took advantage of it”. The lawyer also said that he was prepared to present arguments on the maintainability of the case but insisted that Imran should first appear in court.

The court after hearing the arguments of both parties reserved its judgment for some time.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023