LAHORE – The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday granted the bail to Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif in a money laundering case filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).
A three-member bench, headed by Justice Ali Baqar Najafi, issued a unanimous verdict, granting him bail against surety bonds worth Rs5 million.
PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz has welcomed the decision in a twitter post, adding that service rendered by the PML-N cannot be eroded by fake cases.
During the hearing, the NAB prosecutor informed the court that members of Shahbaz Sharif’s family are nominated in the case.
He added that Suleman Shehbaz, Nusrat Shahbaz, Rabia Imran, Haroon Yousuf, Syed Tahir Naqvi and Ali Hamid are absconding in the case as they failed to appear before the team despite issuance of summons to them.
Talking about assets of former Punjab chief minister, the NAB lawyer said that Shehbaz held assets to tune of Rs2.1 million in 1990 and they had risen to Rs10.48 million.
Bukhari further said that the opposition leader showed assets of Rs7.32 billion in 2018 and all the assets were made after 2005.
He also shared details of funds received by members of Sharif family through TTs.
After the NAB prosecutor concluded his arguments, Shahbaz Sharif’s lawyer Amjad Pervaiz said that the anti-graft buster had nominated the members of his client’s family with malafide intentions.
He said that the honourable court is hearing case of bail but the NAB lawyer had provided details of money laundering.
The three-member bench after hearing the arguments issued bail to the opposition leader.
NAB arrested Shehbaz on September 28, 2020 in the money laundering reference after the LHC refused to extend his pre-arrest bail last year. He was first granted interim pre-arrest bail last year on June 3.
On Saturday, a two-member bench of the high court had issued a split decision on the Shehbaz’s post-arrest bail plea and referred the matter to the chief justice for the nomination of a referee judge.
Justice Sardar Mohammad Sarfraz Dogar, a member of the bench, had admitted the petition, while Justice Asjad Javed Ghural, had dismissed the same.
LHC Chief Justice Muhammad Qasim Khan had then on Monday formed a full bench to decide the matter.
