Aleem urges NAB to arrest people after completion of probe

LAHORE: PTI leader and former Punjab minister Aleem Khan on Wednesday urged the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to first thoroughly carry out investigation into cases and then arrest people if they are found guilty.

Speaking to the media after being granted bail by the Lahore High Court (LHC) in the assets case, he slammed the bureau’s practice of putting people behind bars before completion of investigation.

The PTI leader said he would have quit politics had he been involved in corruption of a single penny. “If someone metes out injustice to me, Almighty Allah will do justice,” he said.

He said there are certain flaws in the NAB law which needed to be removed, adding putting someone in jail until investigation is completed is a grave injustice.

Aleem appealed to the government of his party to look into the NAB law and questioned why the corruption watchdog failed to gather evidence against him over the past 17 months.

He said if the bureau could not make out a case against him then why he was kept in prison for 100 days.

Earlier today, a two-judge bench, headed by Justice Ali Baqar Najafi, approved the bail of the PTI leader against surety bonds of Rs1 million.

Over the course of the hearing, the investigation officer submitted details of, what he claimed, suspicious bank transactions and investment. “The accused’s sources of income are disproportionate to his expenses,” he claimed, adding the PTI leader didn’t disclose assets worth millions of rupees.