Ephedrine Case: Bail plea hearing suspended till 29th

An anti-narcotics court defers bail plea hearing of former DG health till August 30 in absence of lawyers.

RAWALPINDI:

A lawyers’ strike on Monday prevented the Lahore High Court from hearing the bail pleas of Ali Musa Gilani, the son of deposed prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, and Textile Industries Minister Makhdoom Shahabuddin.

According to the lawyers of the two accused men, the bar had called for a strike following an incident of firing on two Rawalpindi lawyers allegedly by land grabbers.

Justice Khawaja Imtiaz Ahmed and Justice Ibadur Rehman Lodhi of the Rawalpindi bench of the LHC, therefore, put off the hearing till August 29.

Ali Musa and Shahabuddin are accused of pressuring officials of the health ministry in 2010 to allocate huge quotas of controlled chemical ephedrine to two different pharmaceutical companies.

Both accused were present in the courtroom on Monday.

Separately, an anti-narcotics court deferred the hearing of a bail plea of former health director general Dr Asad Hafeez till August 30 in the absence of lawyers.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 28^th, 2012.