SC issues notice to NAB in Editor-in-Chief’s appeal against LHC order

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the appeal filed by Jang/Geo Editor in-Chief Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman against an order passed by the Lahore High Court (LHC) dismissing his post-arrest bail petition in a case relating to a property transaction that took place 34 years ago.

A three-member bench of the apex court headed by Justice Mushir Alam and comprising Justice Muneeb Akhtar and Justice Qazi Muhammad Amin Ahmed heard the case.

The court issued notice to prosecutor general NAB directing him to submit within two weeks complete report as well as record of the trial court in the matter.

Appearing on notice, Khawaja Haris, counsel for the Jang/Geo Editor-in-Chief, submitted before the court that his client has been accused of getting illegal exemption of 54 plots of one kanal in Johar Town Lahore in 1986. The counsel contended that two former officials of Lahore Development Authority (LDA) including its director general (DG), a director as well as the then chief minister Punjab had been alleged for granting the exemption. The counsel submitted that the officials of the LDA and the accused in the case never objected on exemption and neither they were complainant in the present matter. Justice Qazi Muhammad Amin Ahmed asked Khawaja Haris as to whether other two accused, including the two LDA officials, as well as the then chief minister Punjab, have also been arrested.

Khawaja Haris replied that although these accused persons had been nominated in the reference filed against Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman but the anti-graft body had not yet arrested them which is injustice with his client who has been behind the bars for the last seven months.

To a court query regarding the date of arrest, Khawaja Haris informed the court that Mir Shaki-ur-Rahman was arrested on March 12, 2020.

Justice Qazi Muhammad Amin than asked as to whether Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman has been indicted in the case, to which Khawaja Haris replied that his client was not yet indicted as he said that one accused was not present in the country.

The court issued notice to prosecutor general National Accountability Bureau (NAB) asking him to submit within two weeks the report pertaining to the trial court in the matter in hand and adjourned further hearing.

The court had also clubbed two more appeals of Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman as well as his spouse against the order of LHC which were pending in the Supreme Court.

On September 30, Khawaja Haris, counsel for the Editor-in-Chief, had submitted before the court that apart from the main appeal, two more another CPLAs filed by the petitioner and his spouse against the order of LHC were also pending in the apex court. The learned counsel had pleaded that these two CPLAs may also be clubbed with the main appeal which the court accepted and directed its office to do the needful.

It is pertinent to mention here that when Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman was arrested by the NAB in March, 2020 in Lahore, he and his wife had challenged before LHC, his illegal arrest as well as illegal detention by the anti-graft body and physical remand. The LHC had dismissed both the petitions against two CPLAs were filed in the Supreme Court, which were pending. In the appeal, Khawaja Haris, the counsel for Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman, has questioned whether the LHC division bench had dismissed the writ petition and denied bail to the petitioner through gross misreading and non-reading of facts, the record, complete misconception of the applicable laws and the obvious ulterior motives apparent from the conduct of the respondents.

He contended that the arrest and continued incarceration of the petitioner pending trial was not only a violation of the principle of presumption of innocence, but it was also tantamount to punishing the petitioner without trial and, as such, was violative of the fundamental right guaranteed to the petitioner under Articles 9, 10-A, 14, 15 and 25 of the Constitution, and of his constitutionally mandated right to treatment in accordance with the law.

“Whether, in any case non-payment of a sum of Rs143,530,000 to LDA as price calculated on the basis of current market value of the excess land (of 4k-12M) sold to the petitioner in the year 1986 could be made the basis for framing a case against the petitioner for alleged offence falling under any provision of NAO, 1999, without compliance of the mandatory pre-condition of 30 days’ notice as stipulated by Section 5(r) of NAO, 1999, and, in so far as no such notice was ever served upon the petitioner in terms thereof, the petitioner’s arrest and detention on this basis is void ab initio and violative of his fundamental rights under Articles 4, 9, 14, 15 and 25 of the Constitution,” Khawaja Haris had further questioned.

Similarly, he had questioned whether denial of bail to the petitioner by the High Court, and thereby his continuous incarceration, inter alia, for alleged non-payment of purported dues to LDA, without there being any adjudication thereof by a competent court of law after observing due process, was not violative of petitioner’s fundamental right guaranteed under Article 10-A of the Constitution.

Haris submitted that the petitioner was suffering from Tinnitus, Sleep Apnea, breathing disorder, hyperventilation and acute anxiety and his recent medical tests had revealed a growth in his kidney, two cysts in the prostate, and blood in the urine, while in judicial custody the doctors who checked him suspected malignancy. He further submitted that two of his siblings, one brother and a sister, had died from cancer.

He had further submitted that the petitioner was in continuous incarceration, while he carried a family history of cancer, in that 6 of his 9 family members, including his parents, had suffered from this lethal disease, had to be kept under constant medical surveillance in home and free to move for treatment from his doctors, his continued incarceration was aggravating his acute anxiety disorder which was consequently further aggravating his lethal sickness.