PESHAWAR: A special tribunal (foreign exchange regulation) has acquitted five employees of a privately-owned currency exchange company charged by the Federal Investigation Agency with launching money and illegally possessing foreign currency notes.

Additional sessions judge Shahid Mahmood accepted an application of the five accused under Section 265-K of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which empowers the trial court to acquit an accused before the conclusion of a trial when there is no probability of his conviction on the basis of the available evidence.

The accused included Pakistan Currency Exchange branch manager Anwarul Haq, operation manger Sabihuddin, cashier Naseer Asghar, and employees Sohail Humayun and Sher Khan.

The FIA’s Commercial Banking Circle had registered an FIR against the management and staff members of the Pakistan Currency Exchange, Peshawar, on Nov 26, 2015, under sections 4 and 8 of the Foreign Exchange Regulation (FER) Act, 1947, sections 3 and 4 of the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Act, 2010, and sections 201 and 206 of the Pakistan Penal Code.

They were charged by FIA with doing illegal currency exchange business

The FIA claimed that the accused were involved in the illegal business of foreign currency exchange and had recovered Rs43,907 million Pakistani rupees, 192,210 US dollars, 1,000 Swiss francs, 91,000 Japanese yens, 6,737 Saudi riyals, 8,200 Australian dollars, 1,205 euros, 7,820 UAE dirhams and 7,350 Canadian dollars during a raid.

Farooq Malik, lawyer for the accused, said the Pakistan Currency Exchange was registered with the State Bank of Pakistan and the Security Exchange Commission of Pakistan and carried out business legally.

He said during investigation, a lot of correspondence had taken place among the investigation officer, SBP and SECP.

The lawyer said the SBP told the investigation officer that it hadn’t received any complaint against that company during the last five years.

He said the SBP had also declared that since the company was a registered one and, it could deal in foreign exchange and money transfer through banking channels provided that it should not exceed the specified limit.

Mr Malik said the SBP audit report on the company’s financial records didn’t show any violation of the FER Act and AML Act.

The tribunal pointed out in the judgment that the statements of the investigation officer and complainant revealed that the Pakistan Currency Exchange had duly been registered with the SBP and SECP and that it dealt in money exchange under a valid licence.

It ruled that during investigation, the SBP had responded to various FIA letters declaring that the paid-up capital of the company was Rs800 million.

The tribunal added that the investigation officer had failed to collect any records, which could show that the company had exceeded its money exchange limit.

It declared that the investigation officer didn’t bring on record any material, which could show that the accused had acquired that amount through any criminal activity or were involved in money laundering.

Published in Dawn, December 22nd, 2020