ATC grants bail to 17 lawyers

The court orders furnishing surety bonds of Rs100,000 each to avail the relief

LAHORE: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Thursday granted bail to 17 lawyers allegedly involved in the Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) rampage case.

The court ordered for furnishing surety bonds of Rs100,000 each to avail the relief. ATC Judge Arshad Hussain Bhatta conducted the proceedings on bail applications, filed by the accused lawyers - Abdul Shakoor, Muhammad Shahbaz and others.

At the start of proceedings, the investigation officer submitted a record of the case and stated that 25 lawyers had been identified through closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras footage so far and the process was underway for identification of the others.

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Petitioners' counsel argued that the accused were not present on the place of occurrence and they did not have any link with the incident. He pleaded with the court for a grant of bail to the accused.

However, a prosecutor opposed the applications, saying that the accused were arrested from the scene of occurrence. He requested the court to dismiss the bail applications of all the accused.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 20^th, 2019.