Hamza Ali Abbasi gets warning letter for 'spreading rumour'

The Prosecution department of the Punjab government has sent warning letter to actor Hamza Abbasi alleging that his August 3, 2016 Facebook page is misleading.

Hamza, in the post, claimed that in three months over 900 child kidnappings occurred, which include 400 such incidents from Lahore alone.

Breaking: Hamza says won’t apologise over Facebook post

The copy of warning letter available with ARY News─bearing signature of Additional Secretary Prosecution Mahmood Hassan ─ states that the official record shows the number of children went missing over the last three months (May, June and July) is less than one third compared to Hamza Abbasi’s allegation on Facebook.

The letter stated that the Abbasi’s post was exaggerated and created sense of insecurity among the general public.

Related: Sindh, Punjab police deny surge in child kidnappings across the country

It is further communicated through the warning letter that Abbasi had not verified the information so he should immediately take corrective action and acknowledge his error.

The letter warns Abbasi that if he does not seek apology over disseminating wrong information, the government would be constrained to initiate legal action against him for spreading rumours which created panic in the public at large.

Prosecution department officials claimed that they would get a case registered against Hamza Ali Abbasi under section of 505 (b) of PPC under which he could awarded seven years imprisonment along with fine.

The Prosecution department has also sent a similar notice to another citizen, Muhammad Hassan Feroze, who had stated in a post on his Facebook page that two kids went missing from his neighbourhood and their bodies were subsequently found with organs missing.

The notice says the post left their parents, who lived in EME Society in a state of shock.

However, the official record shows that no such incident had taken place and the Feroze’s Facebook Post was malicious and calculated to spread panic in public at large.

Hamza’s reaction

Hamza Ali Abbasi, while talking to ARY News, claimed that he had taken the figures from a national English newspaper so the government should take action against the newspapers management instead of sending warning notice to him.