SHC dismisses bail applications of bank officials in Rs400 million fraud case

The Sindh High Court (SHC) has dismissed bail applications of private bank officials in a bank fraud case.

Adeel Latif, Ayesha Mirza and Asad Khan were arrested by the police for sanctioning gold finance loan of more than Rs400 million to different customers, most of them dummies, against fake and artificial gold deposited with the bank.

The counsels for the applicants submitted that they had been falsely implicated in the case as no

incriminating evidence was collected against them. They submitted that the applicants had no nexus with the sanctioning of gold finance loans and no evidence in this regard had been collected by the prosecution.

An additional prosecutor general and the private bank’s counsel opposed the bail applications stating that the applicants were bank officials through whom the sanction of gold finance loan in favour of fake/dummy customers was proposed, sanctioned and disbursed. They said that not only in the investigations but in the departmental proceedings, the applicants were found involved in this scam in which more than Rs400 million of the bank was misappropriated.

A division bench of the high court headed by Justice Mohammad Iqbal Kalhoro after hearing the arguments and perusal of the material available on record observed that the FIR showed that the bank officials in collusion with private persons were able to get different loans sanctioned against artificial gold in the name of dummy customers while in some cases by using national identity cards of persons lured under the Ehsas Program for the purpose.

The high court observed that such a scam surfaced only after an audit of the bank was conducted by officers of the head office and the bags of gold kept in lockers were found containing artificial gold. The bench observed that prima facie, the applicants appeared to be connected with the alleged offence. It observed that the applicants had filed applications for bail in the trial court before submission of the final challan which the prosecution had filed and now the case was ripe for recording of the prosecution evidence.

The SHC dismissed the applications and directed the trial court to examine material witnesses

within a period of three months. The high court observed that after the examination of material evidence, the applicants would be at liberty to file a fresh application for bail before the trial court, which, if filed, shall be decided on its own merits.