PESHAWAR, May 22: The Peshawar High Court on Wednesday granted bail to a private contractor in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police weapons and vehicles purchase scam after he turned approver and agreed to voluntarily return Rs102 million to the provincial exchequer.

A bench comprising Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Musarrat Hilali directed the petitioner, Arshad Majeed, to furnish two surety bonds of Rs0.5 million each.

Majeed, owner of private arms supply company Majeed and Sons, and police budget officer Jawed Khan were arrested after National Accountability Bureau began inquiry against senior officers of the provincial police and many others over the alleged embezzlement in procurement of weapons, equipment and vehicles in 2009-10 by violating the government rules.

Though several current and former senior police officials are suspected of being involved in the alleged embezzlement, the NAB, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has arrested only two suspects until now.

There is a likelihood that after Majeed turned approver and agreed to cooperate with investigators, more arrests would be made in the next few days. The purchases totaled around Rs7 billion.

Athar Minallah and Barrister Mudassir Ameer, lawyers for the petitioner, said three months had passed since the petitioner was taken into custody by NAB and that the bureau had so far not filed reference against him before the court concerned.

NAB deputy prosecutor general Jamil Khan informed the bench that the accused had made a request to NAB under Section 25 of the National Accountability Ordinance, 1999 for voluntary return of the ill-gotten wealth.

He said the petitioner had agreed to become approver and would appear as prosecution witness against other accused.

The NAB deputy prosecutor general requested the bench not to allow bail to the petitioner for next the few days for the recording of his statement.

He said the bureau had received a Rs30 million bank draft from the petitioner, whereas he had agreed to pay Rs102 million.

The petitioner’s lawyer said NAB had already frozen the petitioner’s bank accounts, so he could no longer operate it.

Lawyer Minallah requested the bench that if NAB defreezed the bank accounts, his client could produce cheques of the outstanding amounts of money.

The NAB deputy prosecutor general said he would not oppose the bail if it was made linked to the petitioner’s cooperation to investigators and that prior to his release, he paid the outstanding amount of money.

The NAB has alleged that during initially inquiry, it was revealed that gross violation of procurement rules were committed by the purchase committee in awarding tenders to favourite contractors, including the petitioner.

It added that most purchases were made through a contractor, who had no previous experience of supplying police weapons and vehicles for which payments were made in advance.

Four army officials, including a colonel and three majors, were sacked from the military service in Sept 2012 for receiving kickbacks while inspecting the arms purchased by police in 2010.

They were found guilty of receiving Rs11 million from the contractor to clear the items provided by his company, including bulletproof jackets, weapons and ballistic proof helmets.