PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Thursday reserved its order on the petition of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leader retired Captain Mohammad Safdar for pre-arrest bail over an ongoing inquiry of the National Accountability Bureau, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, against him for allegedly holding assets beyond means.

A bench consisting of Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Syed Arshad Ali fixed Apr 27 for pronouncing the order asking the petitioner to show up on that date.

The petitioner, who is also the son-in-law of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, was given an interim pre-arrest bail in Oct last year, which was extended from time to time afterward.

Lawyers Mudassir Ameer and Manzoor Khalil appeared for the petitioner, whereas the NAB, KP, was represented by its senior prosecutor, Azeemdad.

Barrister Mudassir said the NAB inquiry or investigation against his client was based on mala fide intent as he had appeared before the NAB combined investigation team on multiple occasions.

PML-N leader moved court against NAB probe into his assets

He said the petitioner had provided the sought-after information to the investigation officers but even then, the NAB chairman issued warrants for his arrest.

The lawyer said currently, the NAB had been probing two cases against his client, one in Peshawar and another in Lahore.

He said the property about which the inquiry was in progress was purchased by Mr Safdar’s father in 1997 and its all records were available.

The counsel said a land measuring 53 kanals and 10 marlas was purchased in 1997 over which a flour mill was constructed in 1998. He added that the said mill named Rehmat Flour Mills was subsequently gifted to MrSafdar’s son by his grandfather.

He contended that property was not only gifted to Safdar’s son rather his father had also gifted different properties to other grandchildren, details of which were available on record.

The counsel argued that the case in question was of total amount of around Rs 25 million, whereas under the SOPs of the NAB it had not been dealing with cases having amount of less than Rs 100 million.

Barrister Mudassir said his client had appeared before the investigation team on different occasions, while a call-up notice was issued to him on Sept 17, 2020, along with a questionnaire and he had responded to it in detail.

He said as all records had been provided to the investigation team and the inquiry/investigation had been completed, there was no need for his arrest.

The counsel further said Article 9 of the Constitution declared that the ‘petitioner will not be deprived of his or her liberty save in accordance with the law’.

The lawyers said it was by now settled in light of the superior court judgments that in the absence of some solid and cogent evidence or complaint, the NAB had no authority to harass and torment citizens through vague call-up notices and unwarranted arrests.

NAB prosecutor Azeemdad contended that the inquiries in Lahore and Peshawar were of different nature.

He said the petitioner couldn’t provide satisfactory explanation to the properties in question due to which his arrest warrants were issued.

The prosecutor said the petitioner had also tried to fabricate certain documents and there was also over-writing on some of the property documents. He said during the course of inquiry, evidence had been collected against retired Captain Safdar showing that he had purchased properties in Mansehra in his name and that of his benamidars.

He added that the PML-N leader had also established a flour mills and purchased properties without having any lawful income.

Published in Dawn, April 23rd, 2021