Court adjourns fake bank accounts case hearing till May 21

ISLAMABAD: An accountability court on Thursday adjourned hearing in the fake bank accounts case till May 21, ARY News reported.

Former president and Pakistan People’s Party co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and his sister Faryal Talpur appeared before the court amid tight security.

Justice Muhammad Arshad Malik presided over the hearing of the case.

At the outset of the hearing, Zardari’s counsel asked the NAB counsel to provide copies of the reference to his client and other 30 accused in the case.

NAB’s prosecutor replied that so far 28 copies of the reference have been printed out, the process is underway, and it will take some time.

Judge Arshad Malik directed the NAB’s prosecutor to provide the copies of the reference to the accused at earliest.

“Investigation Officer (IO) Ali Ahmed Abro unable to appear before the court today due to head injury”, the prosecutor told the court.

To this, the judge asked, only a single man is working and seeing all the matter, don’t you have team work?

During the hearing, the court accepted one day exemption plea of Zain Malik, another accused in the reference as he was unable to appear before the court due to bone marrow issue.

A heavy contingent of security personnel were deployed around the court to prevent any untoward incident.

On the other hand, Zardari sent an application to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) investigation team and sought more time for appearing before it.

Read more: Efforts underway to save corrupt elements in fake bank accounts case: sources

The application also mentioned that he was scheduled to appear before the accountability court, and therefore he could not show up in the bureau.

On May 8, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) granted him pre-arrest bail till May 15 in the case related to alleged illegal award of contracts to private firms.

The case is part of an ongoing investigation being conducted by the anti-graft watchdog after the Supreme Court forwarded the joint investigation team (JIT) report in the fake accounts scandal and directed it to probe money laundering of billions of rupees through fictitious bank accounts and file references.