LAHORE, July 15: An ehtesab appellate bench of the Lahore High Court on Tuesday set aside the conviction of former parliamentary secretary Rana Tanveer Husain in a NAB reference.

The bench, comprising Justice Ali Nawaz Chauhan and Rustam Ali Malik, withheld the Lahore accountability court verdict in which the former MNA was awarded five years of rigorous imprisonment and fined Rs6.9 million on charges of amassing assets illegally. His 10-year disqualification from public office under Section 15 of the NAB Ordinance was also revoked.

While allowing his petition against the verdict, the bench ruled that the petitioner had given a reasonable explanation regarding the assets that were said to have been acquired illegally. The court upheld the stance of petitioner in his written statement, recorded by the trial court under Section 342 of the CrPC. “We are inclined to believe that the explanation given by the petitioner regarding the properties in question might be correct, though not exactly accurate in mathematical terms.”

According to bench members, though the NAB Ordinance overrode all other laws dealing with accountability or corruption, it could not ignore the fact that petitioner’s declaration before the income tax authorities regarding his assets had been accepted and no departmental proceedings initiated against him. The court concluded its judgment, ruling that the defence evidence made out a reasonable case in favour of the petitioner.

In his written explanation, the petitioner conceded to have encashed a US dollar bond for Rs4.6 million saying that the amount was protected under the Economic Reforms Act 1992 and couldn’t be called into question. He claimed to have availed a concession granted by the government to all citizens, and said he couldn’t be singled out on this account. Mr Tanveer further claimed to posses financial sources to match the acquisition of assets worth over Rs6 million.

The former MNA was accused of concealing the purchase of certain agriculture land by showing it to be a land exchange transaction, and subsequently evading wealth tax on that property.

He allegedly acquired assets worth Rs6.9 million — disproportionate to his known sources of income: A three-kanal plot on the Upper Mall, on which he constructed a palatial house; a two-kanal piece of agriculture land, out of which one kanal was shown as a gift to evade the wealth tax; a one-kanal plot at Gulshan-i-Zafar, Muridkey, on which he constructed a Rs7.25 million house; shares worth Rs10.55 million in different private companies and 202 kanals of agriculture land at Kot Yaqoob in Muridkey.

He allegedly opened foreign currency accounts and deposited $42,000 in one of those accounts on June 23, 1997. The money was withdrawn on the same day and a fake encashment certificate obtained regarding this transaction in order to avail protection under the Economic Reforms Act 1992.

Allegedly, a US dollar bond was encashed by the petitioner for Rs4.6 million in January 1999. According to the prosecution, the petitioner could not account for all these assets, which were not disclosed to the wealth tax authorities.