FIA likely to obtain Dania Shah’s remand today over ‘obscene video’

The Federal Investigation Agency arrested Syeda Dania Shah, widow of Aamir Liaquat Hussain, at her home in Punjab’s Lodhran district and brought her to Karachi on Friday to investigate a case relating to the release of an “obscene” video of the late televangelist and lawmaker.

An FIA team presented her before the court of a judicial magistrate of District South, but it could not obtain her remand after it was told by court staff that the court timings were over. The team was told to come again on Saturday (today) for the procurement of remand.

On October 10, the FIA registered an FIR under sections 20, 21 and 24 of the PECA Ordinance 2016 against Shah, who had filed for divorce in May this year after developing differences with the lawmaker, on the plea of his daughter Dua Aamir. Dua Aamir had filed a written complaint with the FIA against Shah, the third wife of the deceased Hussain, alleged that she had made an indecent video of her father and shared it on social media. Hussain had passed away in June this year.

Shah was taken into custody from Lodhran after important evidence was said to have come to light during the investigation. After failing to obtain her remand on Saturday, the FIA officials took her back to the FIA Cybercrime Circle, where her mother, Salma, staged a protest against the raid and arrest of her daughter. She complained that several police officers raided her house and subjected them, including the children, to torture. She also accused the officers of thrashing and dragging Shah to a police van at the time of her arrest.

According to the FIR, an inquiry No. 518/22 dated July 29, 2022 has been registered on tthe complainant of Dua Aamir, daughter of the late lawmaker, against Shah, her mother and others. Dua said in the complaint: “My father Amir Liaquat died on June 9 this year due to his third wife, namely Dania Bibi (who had filed for Khula and my father reply to this khula is attached too). She made an absence video of my father and made it viral on social media, which caused serious stress and depression to my father, and for the reason he died.”

The FIR further reads that during the course of the inquiry, the undersigned recorded a statement of the complainant, and collected evidences provided by the complainant and material available on social media. It came on record that Dania Bibi, daughter of Malik Mukhtiar Ahmed, being the third wife of deceased Aamir Liaquat, recorded his absence videos with the intention to use them to humiliate him. The interview of Dania Shah on May 8, 2022, available on social media reflects that she had intentions to display such absence videos and subsequently she transmitted these videos publically through social media on May 11, 2022, and onward with false facts in respect of Aamir Liaquat.

Shah also accepted her criminal act publically in different interviews available at different links. The FIR says that prime facie it is established that Dania made sexually explicit videos of her husband and transmitted the same publically to create hatred against his modesty that resulted in fear of violence and distress in the mind of deceased.