LAHORE: An accountability court on Monday rejected a request by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for further physical remand of the Lahore Development Authority’s former director general Ahad Khan Cheema in Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme case and sent him to jail on judicial remand.

A NAB prosecutor, Waris Ali Janjua, told the court that 90-day physical remand of the suspect had been completed in the case, and that during the investigation allegations of making assets beyond known sources of income by the officer had surfaced.

He pointed out that important information had been retrieved from the personal laptop of Mr Cheema and a transaction of US$200,000 had also been traced in the bank account of the officer’s brother.

He said further custody of the suspect was required to investigate the allegations of illegal assets. He asked the court to allow another 14-day physical remand of Mr Cheema.

On the other side, the suspect’s counsel opposed the prosecutor’s request, arguing that the bureau was asking for a separate remand in the same case. He said the law did not allow such remand while the NAB had exhausted the limit of the maximum remand (90 days).

The presiding judge, Najamul Hassan, turned down the bureau’s request and sent Mr Cheema to jail on judicial remand. The judge also sent a co-suspect, Shahid Shafiq, of Bismillah Engineering Services Company, on judicial remand. Both suspects were shifted to the Camp Jail.

After the judicial remand, Mr Cheema can now move the Lahore High Court for the relief of bail.

Ahad Cheema was arrested by the NAB on Feb 21, 2018, on charges of misusing his authority with criminal intent and allegedly awarding Rs14 billion contracts of the Ashiana-i-Iqbal housing scheme. It said procurement rules had been violated by the former chief of the LDA.

The NAB alleged that the company owned by Mr Shafiq was a proxy firm working on behalf of Paragon City Developers (Pvt) Ltd. It further said Mr Cheema received illegal gratification in the form of 32 kanals of land from the owners of Paragon developers.

Published in Dawn, May 22nd, 2018