Punjab lawmaker gets bail before arrest

The complainant accused the MPA and her husband of finagling $150,000 from him.

KARACHI:

The Sindh High Court on Saturday granted protective transitory bail to Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid MPA from Punjab, Zubia Rubab Malik, for 14 days in a fraud case that had been registered against her and her husband in Lahore.

Justice Hasan Azhar Rizvi, who headed the single bench, granted the pre-arrest bail after the accused had deposited surety bond of Rs100,000.

Zubia Rubab and her husband Asim Malik had been booked in a criminal case that was registered at the Sarwar Road police station in Lahore.

The complainant, Atif Shabbir, had reportedly approached Future Concerns, an immigration company operated by Asim Malik, for help regarding his pending immigration to England since 2010. He maintained that Asim Malik asked him to bring a bank statement in his name showing a balance of Rs1 million.

Shabbir claims in his petition that to process his case, he gave $150,000 to Asim at the latter’s office, in the presence of MPA Zubia Rubab and other employees of the company. He added that he lodged FIR No. 166/2012, under Sections 406 and 506 of the Pakistan Penal Code against Zubia Rubab and her husband, after the accused did not process his visa application and also refused to return the amount he had paid.

MPA Zubia Rubab’s lawyers, Hasaan Sabir and Nadeem Sheikh, argued that the criminal case was based on malafide intentions of the complainant, who wanted to harass and humiliate the PML-Q MPA. They maintained that Zubia Rubab had left the consultant company after she was elected as member of the Punjab Assembly. Therefore, she had nothing to do with the alleged offences, as mentioned in the FIR.

The lawyers prayed to the court to grant protective bail to Zubia Rubab, as the offences mentioned in the FIR were bailable.

After preliminary hearing, Justice Hasan Azhar Rizvi granted the bail request “without touching the merits of the case”.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 11^th, 2012.