ISLAMABAD: A court in the federal capital has granted bail to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Information Secretary Raoof Hasan in the anti-state propaganda case, but he will not be released.
Duty Magistrate Abbas Shah, a judge of the special court recently formed to hear cases filed under the Prevention of Electronic Crimes (PECA) Act, 2016, issued the verdict on Thursday.
The PTI leader cannot come out of jail today as an anti-terrorism court had on Wednesday handed him over to the counter-terrorism department in a terrorism case for two days — the remand ends tomorrow. Hasan, including nine other suspects, have been granted bail in the case against bail bonds worth Rs50,000. The PTI information secretary and others, on July 22, were taken into custody by the Islamabad Police and subsequently handed over to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).During the hearing, the defence counsel said that the agency’s case against the suspects bases on just one person, Waqas Janjua’s statement.”Three women have already recieved bail; nine others are awaiting an order. The suspects are salaried employees who have nothing to do with Raoof Hasan,” he told the court.
They work as watchmen, gardner, messenger at the PTI Secretariat, but they are behind bars for so many days. Let’s leave Hasan’s issue for now, but what have these salaried people done, he questioned.
“What is state? According to the law and the constitution, the people are the state,” he said, concluding his arguments, following which the verdict was reserved and announced shortly.