KARACHI, July 29: Justice Musheer Alam of the Sindh High Court on Friday admitted Mr Rasheed Channa, reporter of the Star, to pre-arrest bail till Aug 8 against a surety of Rs 100,000.

Abdul Hafeez Lakho, advocate, appearing for Mr Channa submitted a number of documents, including newspaper clippings about alleged illegal activities of the complainant, Abdul Ghafoor Chisti, including land-grabbing and car-lifting.

According to case FIR (235/2005) registered at PS Sachal, the complainant was called to attend a meeting to settle a family dispute involving him (Chisti) with his in-laws.

The complainant stated before the police that he was fired upon near Kiran Hospital by accused Rasheed Channa and co-accused Perviaz, but bullets missed him.

The bench, after perusing the police papers and other documents, admitted the applicant to pre-arrest interim bail till Aug 8, issuing notice to the state.

Bail granted: The Sindh High Court on Friday granted bail to a clearing and forwarding agent in a drug case.

Tahir Malik was arrested on charge of smuggling 22 kgs of heroin. Prosecution stated that the applicant was one of the co-accused involved in smuggling of drugs in the garb of exporting a consignment to Kuwait.

His counsel Ilyas Khan and Mohammad Farooq contended that applicant had nothing to do with the offence, and no contraband had been recovered from his possession.

They said that the prosecution could not establish connection of the applicant with the exporter, nor he had knowledge about the contraband.

SHC’s division bench, comprising Justice Syed Ali Aslam Jaffery and Justice Gulzar Ahmed, after hearing the bail application ordered the release of the applicant on bail with a surety of Rs 1 million.

Meanwhile, the same bench also ordered release of an accused Shabbir Bhatti on bail. He, along with others, is charged with killing Azizullah in the limits of Thull police station on July 16, 1997.—APP/PPI