HYDERABAD: A Cust-oms officer, Momin Shah, was sent to jail upon the expiry of his eight-day remand in FIA custody on Tuesday in a case pertaining to stuffed trophies of protected animals and an unlicensed private zoo established in Hyderabad (rural) taluka.

Momin Shah’s son, Ameer Shah, has been granted interim pre-arrest bail in two separate cases registered by the Sindh Wildlife Department which related to the FIA case.

According to FIA’s Additional Director Syed Wasi Hyder, Momin Shah was produced before the judicial magistrate-XI, who remanded him in judicial custody on the expiry of his eight-day FIA custody. He said that a separate case under the Customs Act, 1969 would be pursued against him in the Customs Court at Karachi.

SWD officer Wajid Sheikh told Dawn that the department had registered two separate cases about stuffed trophies of five Chinkara deers and one Ibex; and for managing an unlicensed zoo at Sindh Farmhouse, stretched over 16 acres, in Deh Narejani, located in Hyderabad (rural) taluka.

The two cases were registered under relevant sections of the Sindh Wildlife Protection, Preser-vation, Conser-vation and Management Act, 2020, he said, earguing that stuffed trophies of Chinkara and Ibex proved that the animals must have been hunted somewhere in violation of the law. Mr Sheikh said that the second case pertained to the ownership of the Sindh Farmhouse.

He said that SWD officials had visited the zoo where Ameer Ali Shah accepted its ownership.

The matter was taken up by the additional sessions judge-VII, who granted interim pre-arrest bail to Ameer Ali Shah and fixed the next hearing for October 2.

The FIA had claimed Momin Shah’s arrest on Sept 19 and booked him in FIR No.20/23 under Sections 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947; and Section 158 of the Customs Act, 1969 read with Section 109 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) on the complaint of FIA’s Sub-Inspector Ghulam Akbar Soomro.

Published in Dawn, September 29th, 2023