Lahore court grants pre-arrest bail to Hafiz Saeed

An anti-terrorism court (ATC) in Lahore on Monday granted pre-arrest bail to Mumbai terror attacks mastermind and Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed and three others in a case pertaining to the banned outfit's alleged illegal use of land for its seminary.

Besides Saeed, interim bail was granted to Hafiz Masood, Ameer Hamza and Malik Zafar, until August 31 against surety bonds of 50,000 Pakistani rupees each, reports Dawn news.

During the hearing, the legal counsel of the accused insisted that JuD was not using any piece of land illegally and urged the court to accept bail pleas.

Meanwhile, the Lahore High Court (LHC) issued notices to the federal government, the Punjab government and the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) regarding a petition filed by Saeed and his seven aides, challenging a case carrying charge of terror financing lodged by the CTD.

A two-member bench of the LHC asked the parties to submit their replies within two weeks.

A lawyer for the federal government objected to the notices, arguing that the petition was non-maintainable. The bench, however, dismissed the objection and adjourned proceedings until July 30, Dawn news reported.

According to the joint petition submitted earlier in July, the JuD leaders submitted that the facts, narrated in the impugned FIR lodged on July 1, illegally described them as members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror group and levelled unlawful allegation of terror financing.

Prior to this on July 3, top 13 leaders of the banned JuD, including Saeed and Naib Emir Abdul Rehman Makki, were booked in nearly two dozen cases for terror financing and money laundering under the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.