IHC adjourns Nawaz’s bail plea till Feb 18

ISLAMABAD (92 News) – The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday adjourned the bail plea of incarcerated prime minister Nawaz Sharif on medical grounds till February 18. A two member bench of the IHC including Justice Aamir Farooq and Mohsin Akhtar heard the bail pleas of Sharif. During the hearing, Nawaz Sharif’s counsel Khawaja Haris pleaded the court for withdrawal of one of the writ petitions filed for the bail of his client. “Is it possible to file two pleas for the bail of a person on two different grounds,” Justice Aamir Farooq asked Khawaja Haris. “Yes it is admissible in the law, but after consultation with my client, we want the court to dispose-off writ petition no 32.” “I want to continue arguments on writ petition no 352,” Haris said. The court while accepting the Haris’s request disposed off petition no 32 and issued notice to the NAB in this regard. In his arguments, Khawaja Haris said that his client is facing health issues and pleaded the court to grant him bail, on the medical grounds in the light of medical board’s report. “One cannot be placed in the prison if he or she were having health issues,” he contented and added there was no facility of heart diseases available at the Services Hospital Lahore. To this, the court said, you [Khawaja Haris] mean to say Nawaz should be shifted to such hospital, where heart disease facility was available? Nawaz should be given proper treatment in the hospital, the bench remarked. The IHC adjourned the further proceedings of the case until Monday (February 18). The former prime minister had filed the petition as well as an appeal against his conviction in the Al-Azizia reference. The IHC registrar office raised some administrative objections to the petition as the legal team submitted with it over 4,000 documents, including papers in foreign languages. Some documents were not readable due to which the petition was fixed for hearing after some delay. A defence counsel removed these objections after which the IHC registrar office fixed the case for preliminary hearing.