Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) Chairman Zafar Hijazi was on Saturday remanded in the custody of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) for four days by a senior civil judge in Islamabad.

The FIA had pleaded to keep Hijazi in custody for a period of 10 days, which Hijazi's counsel had contested. The counsel, Aazid Nafees, had argued that there was no need for Hijazi to be kept in FIA's custody since he had already been investigated for over two months and because his health did not allow for him to be held in custody.

After reviewing Hijazi's medical record, prepared by the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims), Senior Civil Judge Muhammad Shabbir turned Hijazi over to the FIA for four days.

Hijazi was taken from the court in an ambulance.

Hijazi had been taken into custody Friday after his interim bail expired. The FIA had registered a First Information Report against the SECP chairman under Sections 466 (forgery) and 471 (using forged documents as genuine) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC), read with Section 5(2)(47) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, at the agency's Special Investigation Unit (SIU) in Islamabad.

The case was registered on the orders of the Supreme Court after the three-member Panama Papers case implementation bench acted on a report prepared by a joint investigation team (JIT) probing the Sharif family's financial history.

The JIT report had alleged that the SECP chairman had altered records related to the Sharif family owned Chaudhry Sugar Mills.

An investigation team headed by FIA Director Maqsoodul Hassan had subsequently investigated Hijazi and submitted a report on its investigation on July 8, stating that it had found the chairman guilty of altering records.

Opinion

Editorial

Defining extremism
Updated 18 Mar, 2024

Defining extremism

Redefining extremism may well be the first step to clamping down on advocacy for Palestine.
Climate in focus
18 Mar, 2024

Climate in focus

IN a welcome order by the Supreme Court, the new government has been tasked with providing a report on actions taken...
Growing rabies concern
18 Mar, 2024

Growing rabies concern

DOG-BITE is an old problem in Pakistan. Amid a surfeit of public health challenges, rabies now seems poised to ...
Provincial share
Updated 17 Mar, 2024

Provincial share

PPP has aptly advised Centre to worry about improving its tax collection rather than eying provinces’ share of tax revenues.
X-communication
17 Mar, 2024

X-communication

IT has now been a month since Pakistani authorities decided that the country must be cut off from one of the...
Stateless humanity
17 Mar, 2024

Stateless humanity

THE endless hostility between India and Pakistan has reduced prisoners to mere statistics. Although the two ...