In the crosshairs: Mian Iftikhar released on bail in murder case

ANP leader visits residence of the deceased.

NOWSHEHRA: A court headed by Judicial Magistrate Abdul Wahab Qureshi on Monday accepted Awami National Party General Secretary Mian Iftikhar’s bail plea.

Advocate Latif Afridi, along with other senior lawyers associated with ANP, fought the case for Iftikhar. The victim’s father Sher Alam recorded his statement once again before the court, saying “Mian Iftikhar Hussain was not involved in the killing of my son or named in the FIR”.

After hearing the arguments, the judicial magistrate reserved his judgment and announced the ANP leader’s release on bail an hour later in exchange for two sureties and Rs200,000 in bonds.

ANP stalwarts submitted the requirements and Mian Iftikhar was released from the guest house in Nowshera Police Lines where he was being held since Sunday. The premises was declared as a sub-jail by the  magistrate.

Mian Iftikhar said he is being “politically victimised’ by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-led provincial government.

“The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government has no intentions of omitting my name from the murder case or setting me free,” he said while speaking to the media in Nowshera after he was released on bail. “I was released on bail after the father of the deceased exonerated me of the charge.”

Offering condolence

Mian Iftikhar, accompanied by senior ANP leader and MNA Ghulam Ahmad Bilour, went to the house of Habibullah, the victim, after being released to offer his condolences. The ANP leaders offered fateha for the departed and extended their sympathies to Sher Alam as well as other family members.

They later proceeded in a motorcade to Bacha Khan Markaz in Peshawar, chanting slogans against the K-P government, Chief Minister Pervez Khattak and others along the way.

Iftikhar was arrested after PTI worker Habibullah was killed outside an ANP office on main GT Road in Pabbi tehsil.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 3^rd, 2015.