PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Thursday granted bail to a man arrested by the National Accountability Bureau, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for land fraud.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Malik Manzoor Hussain accepted the bail plea of Mohammad Asif after completion of arguments by his and NAB lawyers.

The NAB had arrested him and land acquisition collector Naveed Qadir on Aug 16 for alleged corruption and the illegal receiving of more than Rs18 million in connivance with the Provincial Housing Authority (PHA) officials for the purchase of land for a government housing scheme in Mouza Surezai area of Peshawar.

The NAB had alleged that the petitioner didn’t own any land in said area as suggested by the revenue record.

NAB had held suspect, land acquisition officer last month

Mudassir Amir, lawyer for the petitioner, said his client was first arrested by the NAB in another case, which was related to an alleged illegal land acquisition in Nathiagali.

He, however, said the high court had granted bail to his client on Aug 6.

The lawyer said his client, who did the real estate business, was again arrested on Aug 16 with the NAB accusing him of selling 152 kanals of land for a Nathiagali housing scheme though he didn’t possess the land.

He said the allegations against his client were baseless as he had purchased that land from its owners and that he was ready to produce them all. The lawyer said no loss had occurred to the exchequer by the actions of his client.

He said his client had deposited Rs18 million guarantee with the relevant accountability court as a protest and had committed that the money should be confiscated if he was convicted for land fraud.

NOTICES SUSPENDED: Also in the day, the bench suspended action on the NAB notices issued to six communication and works department engineers for voluntary return of Rs18.7 million allegedly paid in excess to a road builder.

It sought comments of the NAB and the department about the case.

Engineers, including Hameedullah, Asif Iqbal, Akhtar Hussain, Nazar Rehman, Nasrullah and Zahoor Khan, had challenged the NAB notices.

Their lawyer, Muzamil Khan, said the contract for widening and repairing of a 30km stretch of the road from Matta to Fazal Banda area in Swat was given to Muzafarul Mulk company.

He said when his client had learned about excessive payment of Rs18.7 million to the contractor, they had requested the department to recover the amount.

The lawyer said the contractor however moved the court challenging the claim of excessive payment.

Published in Dawn, September 19th, 2014