Daily Times

KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party’s former provincial Information Minister Sharjeel Inam Memon has lost his last hope as the Sindh High Court threw out his application seeking yet another extension in his interim pre-arrest bail in two corruption cases.

Headed by Justice Syed Muhammad Farooq Shah a division bench dismissed the application observing that it had already given more than sufficient time to Memon for surrendering before the trial court by extending his protective bail again and again. “Further extension in his bail would be amounting to abuse of the process of court”, the judges added.

They said that the former Information Minister’s transitory bail was extended more than four times and his surety amount of Rs 3 million has also been forfeited yet he failed to turn up.

The judges added that last time his protective bail was extended on January 18, 2017 to Jan 31 on the condition that no extension would be given in the future.

NAB’s special prosecutor, Muhammad Altaf also opposed the extension in bail.

The self-exiled PPP leader’s lawyer moved the application and submitted that the former minister could not surrender himself before the court due to his ailment. His client wanted to face the corruption charges leveled against him and requested the court to extend his bail for four weeks on medical grounds.

The court had time and again given chances to Memon by extending the period of his bails in two cases to surrender before the trial court and contest corruption charges against him.

It had earlier given him bail in the sum of Rs 1 million each in the two cases to appear before the trial court for further remedy and warned that the amount of surety shall be automatically forfeited if he failed to surrender before the court within the stipulated time. The judges had also made it clear that no further extension shall be allowed in future except in exceptional circumstances.

Before that the court had extended his bail till Dec 26 subject to forfeiture of 50 percent of the surety amount deposited for his bail.

It had also increased the surety amount to Rs 4 million and warned that if he failed to surrender before the trial court within the stipulated time his surety would forfeited.

The former Information Minister is facing charges of corruption in the award of advertisements at exorbitant rates, causing losses of over Rs 5 billion to the National Exchequer.

The PPP leader has also been accused of getting state land allotted and adjusted in 43 Dehs at throw-away prices for a property developer, depriving the public exchequer of billions of rupees in revenue.