ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice Islamabad High Court (IHC) Mohammad Anwar Khan Kasi granted post-arrest bail to two convicts in the Haj corruption case.

Former joint secretary ministry of religious affairs Raja Aftabul Islam and ex-director general Haj Rao Shakeel have already completed their sentence of six years imprisonment on two counts and are still behind bars for not paying the fine imposed on them.

The Haj scandal surfaced in 2010 after the then minister for science and technology, Azam Swati, accused minister for religious affairs Hamid Saeed Kazmi of corruption following which the Supreme Court took suo motu notice of the case in 2010.

The scandal prompted former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to sack both Kazmi and Swati from his cabinet. Shakeel and Islam were arrested in 2011. The IHC chief justice granted bail to them against surety bonds of Rs147.4 million.

On June 3, Judge Malik Nazir Ahmad of the special court central awarded six years’ imprisonment each on two counts to Hamid Saeed Kazmi along with Shakeel and Islam. The court also imposed a fine of about Rs147. 4 million on each of them.

The IHC chief justice had earlier dismissed the bail plea of Kazmi who has challenged the verdict in the Supreme Court.

The counsel for the convicts requested the court to allow them to submit sureties against the fine imposed on them so that they could be released. The counsel said the convicts had already completed their sentences and if the court nullified their conviction there would be no need to pay the fine. If the court upholds the verdict they would further seek relief or pay the fine.

According to a report of the superintendent of Adiala jail, the convicts have completed their jail terms and are behind bars only because they have not paid the fine.

In the report, the jail authorities said the convicts remained in jail as under-trial prisoner (UTPs). Apart from the time spent in the jail as the UTPs, they earned remission and the total period of their sentence has completed.

The report added that the failure to pay the fine would result in additional four years’ imprisonment each.

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2016

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