2007 P Cr (PLP)

RAHMAT HUSSAIN JAFFERI, J.

The petitioner has prayed for the grant of pre-arrest bail in a case, which was being investigated by the NAB Authorities on the allegations that the petitioner in conspiracy with co-accused Sohail Abbas prepared a plan to defraud the bank by getting the loan sanctioned in the name of co-accused Sohail Abbas against forged securities, which were stolen from National Saving Centre. The learned Advocate for the petitioner has stated that the petitioner was Manager, Retail Banking, Askari Commercial Bank, Shahrah-e-Faisal Branch, Karachi; that his duties were to invite people to take loans; that the documents were processed by other officials and, the loan was sanctioned by another branch, therefore, the petitioner has no involvement in the fraud or misappropriation of the bank's amount. Conversely, the learned D.P.G.A. has stated that the petitioner being the Manager, Retail Banking Unit processed the loan of Rs.9,00,000 of the co-accused Sohail Abbasi; that he had moved the file and taken keen interest in getting securities accepted by making forged endorsement of postal authority about the verification of said securities; that the petitioner moved the file for disbursement of the amount and then, subsequently, he received a cheque of Rs.5,00,000 from the co-accused. He has further stated that' the petitioner is involved in the case. We have given due consideration to the arguments, gone through the material available on the record and found that the Investigating Officer examined nine (9) witnesses, out of them six (6) witnesses were officials of Askari Commercial Bank namely, (1) Muhammad Ahmed Farooqui, V.P. Manager Operational, (2) Muhammad Mustafa Kamal Khan, Assistant Manager, (3) Shahbaz Sabor, Senior V.P., (4) Saleem Ahmed Khan, Vice-President, (5) Amir Irshad, Manager and (6) Nihal Ahmed Khan, Chief Manager. He also examined Irshad Ahmed, Postmaster General, Ghulam Abbas and Mansoor Ahmed, father and brother of the co-accused Sohail Abbas. We have gone through the evidence of all these witnesses. From the tentative assessment of the said evidence, we found that on 14-2-2005 the petitioner processed the application of loan of Rs.9,00,000 of the co-accused Sohail Abbas against securities i.e. Regular Income Certificates (R.I.Cs.) of Rs.10,00,

000. The application and documents were processed by him. He sent the file for residential verification report and then the case was forwarded to Head Office Rawalpindi for sanction of the loan. After sanction of the loan he drafted a letter for verification of R.I.Cs. from Postmaster-General on 16-2-2005. The said letter was presented before P.Ws. Muhammad Ahmed Farooqui and Saleem Ahmed Farooqui. They signed the said letter, but obtained the signature of the petitioner on the letter as an acknowledgment. The statements of P.Ws. Saleem Ahmed Farooqui and Muhammad Ahmed Farooqui show that the petitioner had taken keen interest in pursuing the matter, therefore, P.W. Saleem Ahmed Farooqui obtained his signature on the letter. He further stated in his statement that the verification and lien marked of securities (R.I.Cs.) were got arranged by the petitioner personally, which were subsequently, proved to be fake and forged as per statement of P.W. Irshad Ahmed, senior Postmaster, Post Office Nazimabad, Karachi. The statement of' P.W. Nihal Ahmed Khan, who was Chief Manager, further shows that the petitioner undertook the assignment of the lien marked. The verification of the said letter of lien marked dated 16-2-2005 was got verified on 17-2-2005 with endorsement that the R.I.Cs. were validly issued to the co-accused Sohail Abbas, but P.W. Senior Postmaster Irshad Ahmed stated that the said endorsement was forged. On the same date, the petitioner moved the file for disbursement of amount and the file was sent to P.W. Muhammad Ahmed Farooqui for passing appropriate orders of disbursement of loan amount and on the same date the amount was received by the co-accused. The statement of father and brother of the co-accused reveals that from their house they found a receipt of cheque of Rs.5,00,000, which was found to be signed by the petitioner. However, the signature on the said receipt has not yet been verified by the Handwriting Expert. From the tentative assessment of the evidence, we are of the considered view that the prosecution has sufficient material with them to connect the petitioner with the crime and there are reasonable grounds A for believing that he is involved in the case. This is a pre-arrest bail petition in which the main consideration for grant of such bail is to see whether the intended arrest of the petitioner by the NAB Authorities is with mala fide intention or otherwise. The material collected by the NAB Authorities is sufficient on which arrest can be made, therefore, there is no mala fides on the part of the NAB Authorities in arresting the petitioner as such the main ingredients for the grant of pre-arrest bail are missing in the case. Further, the Investigating Officer has no authority to arrest any person unless a warrant of arrest of such person is issued by Chairman NAB. Till this date no warrant of' arrest of the petitioner has been issued by the' competent authority as stated by the learned D.P.G.A. The observations made in this order are tentative in nature, which shall not cone in the way of trial Court in deciding the case on merits. Consequently, the petition was dismissed by our short order, dated 8-12-2006. These are the reasons of' the said short order. H.B.T./M-54/K??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Bail refused.