Hate-speech ‘facilitator’: MQM leader gets pre-arrest bail

Khawaja Izharul Hasan claims FIR is ‘fake’

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court granted on Tuesday pre-arrest bail to Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader Khawaja Izharul Hasan in cases pertaining to sedition, facilitation and support of hate speech of London-based founding chief Altaf Hussain.

Headed by Justice Ahmed Ali Sheikh, the two-judge bench granted bail for one week with a direction to furnish a surety of Rs50,000 with the court's nazir (official).

The MQM leader, who is also the opposition leader in the Sindh Assembly, had approached the court seeking pre-arrest bail in connection with an FIR registered at the SITE Superhighway police station.

In the FIR, the complainant had accused various MQM MNAs and MPAs, including Hasan, of facilitating and supporting a hate-speech delivered by Altaf via audio-link from London, where he lives in exile. Allegations of sedition were also levelled against them, as Hussain spoke against state institutions.

Hasan, who was granted interim bail in three cases under the same charges last month, denied the allegations as 'bogus and fake'. Therefore, he pleaded to the court to grant him bail in the case.

The bench granted him pre-arrest bail for one week against a surety of Rs50,000.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2016.