LAHORE   -  Opposition Leader in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif has approached the Lahore High Court (LHC) for post-arrest bail in money-laundering and assets beyond means case.

He filed a petition through Advocate Amjad Pervaiz, wherein the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman and Director General had been made party.

In his plea, Shehbaz submitted that NAB fabricated money-laundering case against him with malafide intentions, as all of his assets had already been declared. He sought bail on various grounds, including the one that his custody was no longer required and trial would take time to complete.

He submitted that the Bureau had filed the challan (charge-sheet) and the trial was in process in an Accountability Court. 

Shehbaz submitted that he was in detention for past many months whereas conclusion of trial was not in sight and it would take a long time to complete. He submitted that the Bureau had all the record and it had nothing to recover from him. He submitted that he could not perform his Constitutional responsibilities as the opposition leader while in detention, and he was 70 years old and a cancer survivor. 

He assured that he would attend the trial proceedings regularly and pleaded with the court for grant of bail. An LHC division bench, headed by Justice Sardar Muhammad Sarfraz Dogar, is likely to hear the petition on March 29.

NAB had nominated 16 persons as the accused in the case. However, only 10, out of 16 , had been indicted yet. Besides Shehbaz Sharif, Hamza Shehbaz, Javeria Ali, Fazl Dad Abbasi, Rashid Karamat, Muhammad Usman, Masroor Anwar, Nisar Ahmad, Shoaib Qamar, and Qasim Qayyum had been indicted in the case. However, Suleman Shehbaz, Nusrat Shehbaz, Rabia Imran, Syed Muhammad Tahir Naqvi, Haroon Yousafzai and another could not be indicted due to their absence from the case proceedings.

In a reference, comprising 55 volumes, the  Bureau had alleged that the Shehbaz Sharif  family committed massive money laundering of Rs 7 billion. Yasir Mushtaq, Mushtaq Ahmad, Shahid Rafique and Aftab were declared approvers in the reference.