ISLAMABAD, May 10: The Supreme Court indicated on Thursday that the Asghar Khan case might be wrapped up next week, saying much progress had been made and things had become clear with the filing of a fresh statement by former army chief Gen (red) Mirza Aslam Beg.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, who was presiding over a two-judge bench, postponed the proceedings till May 17 after a brief hearing because of non-availability of the third judge.

The chief justice expressed the hope that the court might complete the proceedings in two days after resuming the hearing on May 17.

The court had taken up a 1996 petition of Tehrik-i-Istiqlal chief Asghar Khan requesting it to look into allegations of ISI’s financing of politicians in the 1990 general election to limit the victory of Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party.

The court asked Dr Khalid Ranjha, the counsel for former director general of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Lt-Gen (retd) Asad Durrani, to submit a reply to Gen Beg’s latest affidavit. In the affidavit submitted on Wednesday by his counsel Muhammad Akram Sheikh, Gen Beg passed the buck to Gen Durrani and claimed that he had not been involved in any manner in the disbursement of donations among politicians.

Advocate Salman Akram Raja, representing Asghar Khan, informed the court that he had submitted a copy of the Mehran Bank Commission’s report after getting it from an anchor of a private TV channel.

Attorney General Irfan Qadir called for determining the authenticity of the report.

He said official copies of the two commissions’ reports were still nowhere to be found, but since the case had been adjourned further he would speed up efforts to trace them.