RAWALPINDI, April 22: Justice Maulvi Anwarul Haq of Lahore High Court (LHC)’s Rawalpindi bench on Tuesday granted bail to Sultan Azam Taimuri, Assistant Inspector General (AIG) National Highways and Motorways Police, and directed him to furnish surety bonds of Rs50,000 in a death in custody case registered with the Gujar Khan police in 1994.

On the last hearing, the court had issued non-bailable arrest warrants of Mr Taimuri, an accused in the death of Pervaiz Akhtar in the custody of Gujar Khan police, with which he worked as an ASP in 1994.

During the last hearing, a police official had told the court that the Assistant Inspector General had been selected for a course in Italy and was on leave for seven days.

According to the prosecution, a Gujar Khan police party led by SHO Mohammad Yar Gondal arrested Pervez Akhtar on June 18, 1994, under the charges of robbery.

The man later died in the police custody.

A judicial inquiry carried out by a resident magistrate on the application of the deceased’s mother the same year concluded that the police officials had used ‘brutal torture’ on the accused besides disallowing him to drink water or eat anything for whole 24 hours.

The inquiry report also revealed that a fake recovery of a 30-bore pistol from the accused was shown by the police.

Mr Taimuri, the then ASP Gujar Khan, reportedly registered another complaint against the accused under section 319/34 - Qatl-i-Khata - at midnight. The magistrate also concluded that police officials had registered false FIRs against the accused to save their necks. The report held the police responsible for the death.

Meanwhile, in a NAB reference, a division bench of the LHC comprising Justice Maulvi Anwarul Haq and Justice Ali Akber Qureshi said the court would keep the case pending till Islamabad Stock Exchange (ISE) decides about its representation in compliance with the orders of the Islamabad High Court in the Rs40 million reference against Intergain Securities Management.

Different people who invested in ISE through Intergain Securities filed complaints with NAB against the company after the 1999 crash of stock market that caused millions of rupees loss to the investors.

NAB filed the corruption reference against Intergain Securities in 2005, where directors of the company Haji Zulfiqar Ahmad, Yaqoob Nasak and Dr Arbab Ali were nominated as accused. Zulfiqar Ahmad then filed a writ petition with the LHC and got stay orders against the NAB inquiry.

The company through its lawyer Mian Abdur Rauf has rejected allegations against them saying the company had yet to recover an amount of over Rs40 million from different clients.