KARACHI: Over a decade later, an anti-corruption court on Friday acquitted Senate Chairman and former prime minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani and others in all 26 cases pertaining to a multibillion-rupee trade subsidy scandal.

The former prime minister, along with former and serving officials of the Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP), including ex-chairman Tariq Iqbal Puri and former director general Abdul Karim Daudpota, was accused of fraudulently approving and disbursing trade subsidies worth billions of rupees to fake companies through fictitious claims and backdated cheques under the Pakistan Peoples Party government at the Centre.

In 2018, charges were framed against Mr Gilani, Mr Puri, Mr Daudpota, former deputy secretary (personal) to the PM, Mohammad Zubair and around 20 others.

The verdict was announced on Friday by Special Federal Anti-Corruption Judge Dr Shabana Waheed, who acquitted Mr Gilani and others in the remaining 14 cases and cancelled their surety bonds after hearing arguments from both sides on applications filed by the accused through their counsel under Section 265-K of the Criminal Procedure Code.

Counsel for Mr Gilani, Farooq H. Naek on Friday said in a media talk that all the accused people nominated in 26 cases pertaining to the TDAP had been acquitted.

These cases, he added, were registered between 2013 and 2014, with identical allegations that an employee of the prime minister house had taken kickbacks in return for granting subsidies.

He said the court’s decision, delivered after a prolonged period, was a clear example of “justice delayed, justice denied”.

Speaking with journalists, Mr Gilani expressed gratitude to his legal counsel and said he was pleased not just for himself, but also for all those who had been acquitted in these cases. Emphasising that his late friend and senior PPP leader, Makhdoom Amin Fahim, should also be exonerated, he expressed the wish that Mr Fahim’s name be included in the list of those acquitted.

When asked whether he intended to take action against those who had instituted the cases against him, Mr Gilani responded: “Those who filed the cases were my coalition partners; I cannot abandon them, I stand by them.”

Published in Dawn, July 19th, 2025