KARACHI: The Special Anti-Corruption (Provincial) Court dismissed on Tuesday the bail applications of former Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA) director general Manzoor Qadir Kaka and ex-Jamshed Town mukhtiarkar Khair Muhammad Dahiri in the Nasla Tower case.

Earlier this month, the court had revoked their interim pre-arrest bail and sent them to prison on judicial remand. Later, both the suspects had moved fresh applications seeking grant of post-arrest bail to them.

On Tuesday, Judge Muhammad Ahsan Khan Durrani pronounced his order reserved last week after hearing arguments from the defence and prosecution.

The judge noted that the defence failed to make out a case for grant of the post-arrest bail to the applicants at the present stage of the trial. Therefore, he dismissed the bail pleas of both the suspects.

In the bail plea, Barrister Iftikhar Ahmed Shah had argued that his client, Manzoor Kaka, was on ex-Pakistan leave and was not aware of the pendency of the present case against him, which was originally a dispute of land allotment between the defunct Karachi Development Authority (KDA) and the Sindhi Muslim Cooperative Housing Society (SMCHS).

He argued that Kaka, being the then director general of the SBCA, had nothing to do with the allotment of the additional land for Nasla Tower, as it had already been done by the KDA and SMCHS.

The counsel argued that 17 co-accused in the case had already been granted bail. Therefore, the applicant may also be granted this relief on the basis of rule of consistency, as permissible under the law.

In March this year, the court had indicted 18 people, including then SBCA officers and office-bearers of the SMCHS in a case pertaining to encroachment upon a thoroughfare, where the now demolished Nasla Tower was illegally built in 2013.

The 15-storey commercial-cum-residential building on Sharea Faisal was demolished on the directives of the Supreme Court for having been built in violation of laws.

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2023