The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has decided to accept the plea bargain request of Mushtaq Ahmad Raisani, Balochistan's former finance secretary as well as Sohail Majeed Shah, the contractor and frontman of Khalid Langove, the former adviser to chief minister Balochistan for finance.

The former civil servants, will pay NAB an amount of over Rs2 billion as part of the plea bargain, a press release issued by NAB on Wednesday said.

On May 6, NAB recovered more than Rs730 million from Raisani's residence in Quetta.

He was accused of embezzling billions of rupees from local government development funds, a senior NAB official, who did not want to be named, had told DawnNews.

Following Raisani’s arrest and the recovery of embezzled money, the provincial finance adviser Langove also immediately offered his resignation from the post.

The Supreme Court on Oct 24 restrained NAB Chairman Qamar Zaman Chaudhry from approving deals for voluntary return, a provision under the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) 1999, that allowed people found guilty of corruption to pay a certain portion of the embezzled money and be released without any stigma.

The option of accepting a plea bargain, however, remains on the cards.