ISLAMABAD, Nov 20: Investigating officer Bisharat Shahzad conceded before an accountability court hearing corruption reference against Naveed Qamar that he had withheld some documents that could be beneficial to the accused.

The accountability court No I was hearing a reference against Naveed Qamar for his alleged involvement in corrupt practices while serving as chairman of Privatization Commission during the Benazir Bhutto government. The prosecution alleged that privatization of Ittehad Chemicals Limited caused huge loss to the public exchequer.

The investigating officer was cross-examined by eminent lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan, who represented Naveed Qamar.

During the cross-examination, the IO admitted that he had selected the record of the case that was to be produced before the court and had withheld several hundred pages, however, he could not remember the contents of those pages.

The IO did not deny that the documents which he withheld were beneficial to the defence.

The IO also admitted that the allegation of loss to the national exchequer to the tune of Rs10 million, which the IO had also mentioned in his report under section 173 of the criminal procedure code (CrPC) could not be attributed to any accused besides he also admitted that he had conducted the investigation of the records of the Chartered Accounts (CA) although he had no experience or expertise in the privatization process, accounting or the corporate affairs.

The court then adjourned the hearing for November 22.

Meanwhile, the same court adjourned the indictment of former director of National Institute of Health (NIH) for Friday (November 23). The court was scheduled to frame charges against the accused today but due to other cases, it decided to defer the indictment for Friday.

The court has decided to frame charges after the prosecution had requested it to do so as it was not amending the charges against the accused.

The prosecution had held Aurengzeb Toru, the ex-director purchase and procurement NIH for accumulating assets disproportionate to his known source of income with alleged connivance of co-accused Sukhbar Khan and Javed Khan. Both the co-accused who ran Khan’s Money Changer business allegedly served as Benamidars and frontmen of the accused.

According to the reference, the accused owned land in his name, his wife and in the name of his two accomplices thus owned a business worth Rs17.2 million.