Man jailed for a decade over fundraising for JuD

An anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Monday sentenced a man to 10 years in prison after he was found guilty of collecting funds for the proscribed organisation Jamaatud Dawa (JuD).

The ATC-XII judge also imposed a fine of Rs1 million on the convict Muhammad Uzair. In case of defaulting on the fine payment, he will have to undergo imprisonment for an additional two years and six months.

According to the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), they had arrested Uzair on the basis of an intelligence report, which stated that he had been collecting funds for the proscribed organisation that had been involved in terrorist attacks in the country.

The officials said that on July 16, 2020, an inspector of the CTD had received a tip-off from a spy about the presence of the accused at a mosque in Nazimabad’s Eidgah area, following which they sent a team to the spot that took him into custody.

They added that two fund-receipt books in the name of the JuD and its welfare wing Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) — also a banned organisation — were seized from the possession of the accused.

On the other hand, the accused contended that he had been arrested from his residence. He said that some policemen took him away in a van saying that they wanted to speak with him at the police station and that he could return home in a couple of hours.

He added that the policemen did not release him but implicated him in a case of terror financing without his knowledge. He refuted the claim that he worked for the JuD or the FIF, and asserted that he was a member of the Jamaat Ghuraba Ahle Hadees.

His attorney argued that the intelligence report cited by the CTD carried the name of a person called Aziz, son of Ibrahim, which definitely was not his client. He said that there were also many lacunae in the prosecution’s statements.

Pronouncing the verdict, the judge observed that neither had the accused testified on oath nor could he produce any evidence in his defence, while the prosecution had successfully established their case.

The judge awarded the accused 10 years in prison for raising funds, six months for being a member of and five years for soliciting support for a proscribed organisation under the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA). All the three sentences will run concurrently.

The FIR of the case had been registered under sections 11-H (fund raising), 11-F(i)(ii)(membership, support and meetings relating to a proscribed organisation) and 11-N (punishment) of the ATA at the CTD police station.