KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Wednesday extended interim bail granted to former Sindh Minister for Information and PPP leader Sharjeel Inam Memon and others till September 12 in a NAB reference filed over Rs 5 billion corruption in Information Department. A division bench of SHC headed by Ahmed Ali M Sheikh heard bail application of Memon and other accused. Memon, Yousuf Kabor, Salman Mansoor, Mansoor Ahmed, Inam Akbar, Gulzar Ali and others appeared before the court. Memon counsel Khalid Javed submitted that Sindh government had ran an awareness campaign in media in 2014. For the campaign, about Rs 4 billion advertisements were released to media. He added that as per PBA rules some advertisement agencies were granted concessions. Special Prosecutor NAB said that some Rs 5.75 billion advertisements were released, adding that an advertisement agency was given discount of Rs 87 lakh on an advertisement costing Rs 60 lakh. He submitted that bills were released to different media houses, FM radios, and newspapers on fake invoices. He added that the approval was granted by the former Information Minister and Secretary Information. Khalid Javed contended that NAB Prosecution was misstating facts. He added that if the allegations narrated by NAB prosecutor were true then the accused must have been in jail. Upon this, Chief Justice Ahmed Ali Sheikh remarked that the court would provide ample opportunity to everyone to defend himself against the charges. On Wednesday, a co-accused lawyer Khawaja Shamsul Islam could not appear before the court due to some pressing engagement. Upon this counsels of the accused pleaded the court to adjourn recoding arguments on the bails application by the counsels. The court adjourned further hearing of the case till September 12. NAB had filed reference against former provincial information minister Sharjeel Inam Memon and others for committing corruption in the award of advertisements of provincial government’s awareness campaigns in electronic media involving over Rs5 billion. As per reference, investigation was conducted regarding corruption and corrupt practices in the advertisement awareness campaigns on TV and FM channels between July 2013 and June 2015 and it was found that the accused acted in connivance with each other resulting in a loss of Rs 3,279,177,029 to the national exchequer. It was revealed in the investigation that an amount of Rs 5,766,479,766 was paid to seven advertisement companies in violation of the Sindh Public Procurement Rules 2010. The reference alleged that the former information minister illegally approved releasing of official advertisements to electronic media for awareness campaigns through the so-called pre-qualified advertising agencies without due competition. Published in Daily Times, August 24th 2017.