LAHORE    -   PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Monday filed a petition in the Lahore High Court (LHC) against her arrest by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the Chaudhry Sugar Mills case.

She has been sent to jail on judicial remand by an accountability court till October 9.  Maryam says in the petition that she is being subjected to political revenge and that National Accountability Bureau has not found even single evidence against her. She was detained on August 8 by National Accountability Bureau officials when she went to the Kot Lakhpat Jail in Lahore to meet her incarcerated father Nawaz Sharif.

In the petition, she sought the court orders for her immediate release from jail. During the sugar mills case hearing, the accountability court had turned down the National Accountability Bureau request to extend Maryam’s physical remand and sent her to jail on judicial remand till October 9.

As per the allegations against Sharif family particularly Maryam Nawaz, NAB says that three foreigners had transferred 11,000 shares worth millions of rupees on Maryam Nawaz’s name and the same share were later transferred to her father.

Besides Maryam, the accountability court had also sent her cousin Yousaf Abbas to jail on 14-day judicial remand till October 9.

As per the National Accountability Bureau  an agreement of division of properties owned by the Sharif family has surfaced during the recent investigation.

According to the National Accountability Bureau allegations, a total of 14.5 million shares of the sugar mills had been divided among Mian Nawaz Sharif, Shehbaz Sharif, Abbas Sharif, their sister Kausar and their mother Shamim Begum. It alleges that the mills’ shares were 26.2 million in 2008 a per the record produced by the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan’s (SECP) record.

The bureau has allegedly found a difference of 11.6 million shares that were not included in Sharif family’s assets. Maryam Nawaz had received a sum sent by Sadiqa Saeed through telegraphic transfers (TTs) in 1998 and later the same money was transferred to the sugar mills.

Likewise, it alleges, three foreigners in 2008 sent shares in the name of Maryam Nawaz and the same shares had been transferred by Yousaf Abbas to Nawaz Sharif. A sum of $ 4.8 million was sent to Yousaf Abbas through TTs and transferred to the mills in order to benefit the mills’ directors and shareholders, the bureau alleges.

However, the Sharif family denies the allegations, saying that investigation had already been conducted into the matter while the sale and purchase of the mills’ shares were done as per the law.