Daily Times

KARACHI: A sessions court has granted bail to former Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) loyalist Nehal Hashmi in a case pertaining to his provocative speech targeting the judiciary and the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) probing the Sharif family’s London properties.

The court approved his bail against a surety of Rs50000.

Hashmi is facing a criminal case registered at the Bahadurabad Police Station for criticizing those investigating the prime minister’s family’ and the judiciary on May 31.

He submitted in the court that his entire speech spans 14 minutes but the media only showed footage of a minute or so, stirring an unnecessary controversy.

The apex court had taken a suo motu notice of the video showing Hashmi making threatening remarks against the Supreme Court and the Panama Joint Investigation Team (JIT).

Earlier the court had given more time to police to submit report on whether the relevant section of the anti-terror law could be incorporated into the FIR registered against Nehal Hashmi, the PML-N’s former loyalist.

The court has given such direction in an application filed by a lawyer seeking inclusion of Section 7 of the Anti-terrorism Act, 1999 into the FIR registered against Hashmi for railing against the judiciary and the Panama JIT members.

The lawyer stated in his application that Hashmi committed an offence aimed at threatening a particular section of society and thus, it attracted the anti-terror law sections as it was a settled law that the offence against society came within the ambit of terrorism.

The SHO had informed the judge that the case was being investigated and if the offence under the anti-terror law was made out against the accused, the relevant section would be incorporated in the investigation report.

Published in Daily Times, July 4^th , 2017.