SC allows Ayyan to leave country

Three-member bench upholds SHC's verdict to remove supermodel's name from ECL

The Supreme Court on Monday allowed supermodel Ayyan Ali to travel abroad.

Upholding Sindh High Court's verdict to remove the model's name from the Exit Control List (ECL), a three-member bench headed by Justice Saqib Nisar dismissed the interior ministry's appeal.

On Saturday, the interior ministry moved the top court against the SHC's January 19 order for removing Ayyan’s name from the ECL. Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Sajid Ilyas Bhatti filed a petition on behalf of the ministry, contending that while the high court could examine the legality of including a person’s name on ECL, granting permission to the accused to go abroad was "beyond its jurisdiction" under article 199(1) of the Constitution.

The petition stated that any person whose name had been placed on the no-fly list could only seek permission for travelling abroad from the court in which his or her case was being tried, not from the high court.

The ministry also argued that referee judge Naimatullah Phulpoto “relied upon the opinion of Justice Muhammad Karim Khan Agha, and did not even discuss the observations … of the other member of the bench while disagreeing with his opinion.” Justice Phulpoto was appointed as a referee by the SHC chief justice after Justice KK Agha accepted Ayyan’s plea while the other judge on the bench dismissed it.



A customs court in November 2015 indicted Ayyan for attempting to smuggle more than $500,000 in foreign currency, to which she pleaded ‘not guilty’.

The model was arrested on March 14, 2015, on charges of money laundering after customs officials recovered $506,000 from her luggage at Islamabad’s Benazir Bhutto International Airport before she boarded a flight to Dubai. She was granted bail in July last year after spending nearly four months in Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail — and after her judicial remand was extended at least 16 times.