ISLAMABAD: A judicial magistrate on Saturday handed over custody of journalist Shahid Aslam to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) for two days in a case related to leak of Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) data about the assets of former army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa.

He was nominated as an accused in the said case for sharing details with journalist Ahmad Noorani, who published the same on a website.

The FIA arrested Mr Aslam from Lahore a day earlier and shifted him to Islamabad. The investigation agency produced him before the magistrate and sought his custody on physical remand.

The prosecutor filed an application seeking his remand to recover laptops and other technical equipment.

The defence counsel opposed the FIA’s request, insisting that the journalist was not involved in the data leak. He argued that the FIA did not follow the standard operating procedure for implicating and arresting a journalist in the alleged crime.

Shahid Aslam says he never shared data with another journalist

Mr Aslam also apprised the court that he had never shared data with Mr Noorani.

The court initially reserved order on the FIA’s request.

However, the judge later issued an order for approving physical remand of the journalist for two days.

In a video of the journalist being escorted out of the court, he could be heard saying: “They are asking me for passwords. I won’t give the passwords. Over my dead body”.

Mr Aslam said he was a professional journalist and had many sources. “I won’t give the password,” he reiterated.

Published in Dawn, January 15th, 2023