From Abid Usman
LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) MPA Nazir Chohan, who was booked by police on the complaint of prime minister’s aide Shahzad Akbar, was arrested from the office of Lahore Development Authority (LDA) on Tuesday, police said.
Police officials told media that Chohan had gone to visit the LDA director general and police arrested him from the office after tracing his location.
Chohan was shifted to the Racecourse police station where the complaint was registered for investigation, police said, adding that he would later be moved to a cell of the cybercrime wing of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). Chohan was later presented in a local court. According to the order, the court observed that the MPA’s “alleged offences are bailable in nature.”
Therefore, Chohan should be released on bail if he submitted bail bonds of Rs100,000 with one local surety to the satisfaction of the court, it states.
If Chohan did not submit bail bonds and the local surety, he would be sent to judicial lockup and would be presented in the court again on August 10 along with a report under Section 173 of the Code of Criminal Procedure which requires the police to submit challan in criminal cases within two weeks.
A first information report (FIR) had been registered against Chohan, who is part of the PTI’s estranged Jahangir Khan Tareen group, on the complaint of Adviser to the Prime Minister on Interior and Accountability Mirza Shahzad Akbar in May. Akbar accused Chohan of making allegations concerning the former’s religious beliefs during an appearance on a television channel, adding that these statements had put his life at risk.
The FIR was registered under sections 506 (punishment for criminal intimidation), 189 (threat of injury to public servant), 298 (making statements with deliberate intent to wound religious feelings) and 153 (provoking to cause riot) of the Pakistan Penal Code.
“The offence has been committed to cause injury to the reputation, body, property and mind of the applicant and cause hatred in public at large towards the applicant,” the FIR states.
It further says that Chohan committed “the offence with the nefarious design to wound the religious feelings of the applicant”.
In response to the registration of the FIR and Akbar seeking legal action against the PTI MPA, Chohan had maintained that he was ready to fight the case.
