KARACHI: Police on Wednesday released former federal minister Babar Ghauri in a case pertaining to allegedly facilitating an incendiary speech of London-based Muttahida Qaumi Movement founder Altaf Hussain in 2015.

After getting released from police custody, Mr Ghauri left Karachi for the United Arab Emirates. on Wednesday night.

Mr Ghauri was arrested at Karachi airport on June 5 after he returned to the country ending his seven-year self-imposed exile. The next day, police shown him arrested in the 2015 hate speech case and obtained his physical remand from the administrative judge of the antiterrorism courts to interrogate him and complete the investigation into the seven-year-old case.

On Wednesday, the investigating officer produced the MQM leader before the administrative judge upon expiry of his physical remand.

The IO verbally informed the judge that the MQM leader was interrogated in custody and no evidence was found to show his involvement in the alleged offence.

He stated that the record showed that he was out of country when the case was registered against him and other party leaders.

The IO further said that the custody of Ghauri was no more required and recommended to set him free due to lack of evidence.

On the other hand, defence counsel Shabbir Shah also argued that his client was in the United States at the time when he along with around 30 other MQM leaders including Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui and Wasim Akhtar were booked in the present FIR.

He also produced travel documents in court and pointed out that majority of the nominated MQM leaders had already been acquitted in the present case.

He asked the court to discharge his client from the case since there was no evidence to prove his presence in the country at the time of occurrence of the alleged incident.

After hearing arguments from both sides, the judge ordered release of the MQM leader.

Later, Advocate Shah confirmed to Dawn that the police had set free Ghauri due to lack of evidence in the case.

However, he is also facing two other cases. Before his return to the country, he had obtained pre-arrest bail from the Sindh High Court in a corruption reference and a money laundering and terror financing case.

The former ports and shipping minister, along with MQM founder and other party leaders, had been booked by the Federal Investigation Agency in 2017 in a money laundering and terror financing case.

Published in Dawn, July 14th, 2022