ISLAMABAD, March 26: Chief Justice Islamabad High Court (IHC) Iqbal Hameed ur Rehman on Friday rejected the bail application of Nauman Asif who is accused of creating fake facebook accounts of his sister-in-law and her daughters. The counsel for the accused Syed Fayyaz Hussain Shah argued before the IHC chief justice that the case had been registered against his client without any evidence. He said that the maximum punishment prescribed for the offence in the law was 7-year imprisonment as normally bail was granted in the cases having less than 10-year imprisonment, therefore, the accused was entitled to be released on bail in the case which required further inquiry.

Tariq Bilal, Legal Adviser to FIA’s National Response Centre for Cyber Crimes (NR3C) while contending the arguments said that the investigation agency collected all the technical information and then arrested the accused and seized the computers used for the illegal acts. He further said that it was a heinous social crime and the accused was not entitled to the concession of the bail. He further said that no further enquiry was required as the charge sheet had been submitted in the court and the trial had already been commenced.

The IHC chief justice after hearing the arguments of both the parties rejected the bail petition.

The bail of the accused had earlier been rejected by Additional District and Sessions Judge, Islamabad Muhammad Tanvir Mir.

Earlier, Muhammad Afzal Qureshi had lodged a complaint with the NR3C alleging that someone had created fake facebook accounts of his wife and daughters showing them as call girls while he was shown as their supplier. However, he said that the telephone numbers, addresses and photographs given in the facebook accounts were genuine.

He said that he had constantly been receiving telephone calls asking him about the availability of his wife and daughters.

On receipt of the complaint, Project Director NR3C Shahid Nadeem Baloch constituted a special team to investigate the case. The technical report prepared by the NR3C revealed that the fake facebook accounts had been created from a location in Blue Area, Islamabad. At this, NR3C team conducted a raid and arrested the accused and seized the computers used to access the internet accounts.