The Lahore High Court on Tuesday confirmed the pre-arrest bail of PTI Chairman Imran Khan in a case linked to concealing facts and evidence about the death of a PTI worker, Zille Shah, in a road accident.

The death of PTI worker Ali Bilal, also known as Zille Shah, during the party’s rally on March 8 had sparked strong protests in Lahore when the postmortem report identified 26 marks on his body. The party had declared that he was allegedly tortured to death by police in custody.

The PTI chief had also expressed his outrage over the incident, alleging that the “unarmed” worker had been killed in police custody,

However, Caretaker Punjab Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi and Punjab Inspector General of Police Dr Usman Anwar, in a joint press conference on March 11, had shared the findings of an inquiry committee declaring that the PTI worker’s death occurred in a road accident.

Although the officials presented videos of the vehicle and the two men who brought the PTI worker to Services Hospital, they could not put forth any footage in which he was hit on the road by a vehicle to substantiate their claim.

On March 15, Punjab Safe City Authority (PSCA) Managing Director Kamran Khan said that police had examined nearly 50 CCTV cameras of both the authority and the Lahore Cantonment installed in the surroundings of Mian Mir overhead bridge from where Zille Shah was picked up by a black car on March 8.

“Out of nearly 50 CCTV footages, the one related to the road accident of Ali Bilal is still missing,” Kamran Khan had told Dawn.

Last week, the LHC had granted Imran bail in the case until today as the former prime minister joined the probe and recorded his statement with the police.

Imran’s counsel Barrister Salman Safdar appeared in the court today.

At the outset of the hearing, Justice Anwarul Haq Pannun pointed to the presence of three prosecutors.

He asked the government’s counsel about how the connection between Imran and the first information report (FIR) in the case.

“Leave aside the fact of who the culprit is and focus solely on whether their bail can be revoked,” he said.

After listening to the arguments, the LHC confirmed Imran’s pre-arrest bail in the case.

LHC directs Punjab govt to present record of cases registered against Bushra Bibi

Separately, the LHC directed the Punjab government to present the record of all the cases registered against Imran’s wife Bushra Bibi in court tomorrow (Wednesday).

It also issued notices to the Punjab and federal governments.

Earlier in the day, the former prime minister’s wife filed a petition with the LHC seeking details of the cases registered against her. The petition, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com, named the Punjab government, the interior ministry as well as the Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Islamabad police chiefs as respondents.

The petition said that various “false and frivolous” FIRs had been registered against Bushra Bibi at various police stations across the country, which had been brought to her knowledge through either the media or “other sources”.

“The copies of those FIRs are not being provided to the petitioner which are so many in number and the petitioner does not know the numbers thereof,” the plea said.

The plea said that Bushra Bibi feared she would be arrested “under the garb of false FIRs”, adding that she was a law-abiding citizen and had never been involved in any criminal case.

It further contended that FIRs were being registered against the petitioner on the “instructions and connivance” of the federal government “just for the purpose of political victimisation”.

The plea urged the court to direct the respondents to provide the details of the cases registered against Bushra Bibi and to bar them from “harassing” her. It also urged the court to grant her protective bail until the petition was decided.

The petition was taken up by Justice Amjad Rafique of the LHC.

During the hearing, Bushra Bibi’s lawyer Intezar Panjotha requested the court to grant his client protective bail. However, the judge refused.