The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has been directed to submit the progress report regarding the multi-billion-rupee National Insurance Company Limited (NICL) scam to the Senate standing committee on commerce, The Express Tribune has learnt.
The FIA headquarters in Islamabad and the FIA Punjab chapter have received letters from the Senate Secretariat for a meeting scheduled to be held on August 25 at 11:00 am, sources revealed.
Additional director general (ADG) FIA and chief investigator of the NICL investigation team, Zafar Qureshi, convened a meeting on Tuesday of the NICL investigation team at the ADG’s camp office at the FIA Punjab office, Lahore, where four witnesses gave their statements.
The witnesses have been told to appear again on Wednesday (today) for further queries.
Alleged main accused in the scam, Akram Warraich, director Privilege Farms (Pvt) Limited company, has also been directed to appear before the investigators.
The FIA has also started preparing drafts and will soon file a petition before the Special Judge Central (Anti Corruption) Court regarding the cancellation of post-arrest bail of accused Warraich, uncle of principal accused Mohsin Habib Warraich, son of Major (retd) Habibullah Warraich, former minister for defence production.
According to sources, the accused had given an undertaking that they would transfer the land in question, measuring 100 acres, in the name of NICL within a span of six weeks. The accused also submitted post-dated cheques worth Rs420 million but after Qureshi’s removal, the accused did not transfer the land to the NICL, despite a lapse of four months.
While going through the NICL investigation case files, Qureshi learnt that some important pieces of evidence had not been included in the challan.
Sources said that several new pieces of evidence will now be included in the challan which will then be submitted before the District and Sessions Judge. The new evidence has the potential to bring to the surface many hidden aspects of the NICL case, sources claimed.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 24th, 2011.
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