ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) Thursday granted protective bails to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader and former National Assembly speaker Asad Qaiser and ex-federal minister Hammad Azhar.
A single bench of Chief Justice Athar Minallah heard the petitions moved by the PTI leaders seeking protection against arrest after multiple FIRs were registered against them for participating in the long march led by Chairman PTI Imran Khan towards Islamabad.
The bench granted bail to Qaiser till June 20 while it directed the respondents not to arrest Azhar till June 13 and adjourned the proceedings. Qaiser, in his petition, stated that he participated in the recent long march on the call of his party head Imran Khan and for that cases were registered against him by the police and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in various cities.
He prayed before the court to issue directives for the provision of complete details and a list of registered cases against him across the country and to stop the police and the FIA from arresting him. He cited Secretary Interior, Inspectors General of Police Islamabad, Sindh and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, and the FIA Director General as respondents in the case.
Azhar, in his plea, adopted the stance that “illegal cases” had been registered against him in various police stations, and he and his family were being harassed. He said that he wanted to join the investigation against him and prayed the court to stop the police from arresting him. The petitioner made the Federation, IGP Punjab, SSP Operations Lahore and others as respondents in the case.
He stated that the respondents in order to satisfy their ill will, on the instructions of the sitting government booked more than 150 unknown accused under the heinous charges of the Anti-Terrorism Act to take the political opponents to task.
The petitioner added that later on it is learnt that all the leadership of PTI including the petitioner have been booked in the above-mentioned concocted FIR. He submitted that the accused/petitioner has falsely been implicated in the FIR in order to harass, pressurize, blackmail and humiliate the petitioner and their families.
He further said that whereas, the petitioner/accused is innocent and has nothing to do with the commission of alleged offences. He maintained that the petitioner seeks kind indulgence of this court through instant writ petition seeking remedy of protective/transit bail from this court in order to approach the appropriate forum.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022