ISLAMABAD: The lawyer for Chaudhry Parvez Elahi, a key ally of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, said on Tuesday a late-night raid at the leader’s home in Gujrat city was illegal and “tantamount to harassment and political victimization,” as a court in Lahore granted Elahi bail until May 15 in an anti-corruption case.
Elahi’s lawyer Amir Saeed Rawn said Monday night’s raid was carried out by the anti-corruption department with the assistance of Punjab police. The raid came just days after a similar operation was carried out at Elahi’s home in the eastern city of Lahore on Friday.
Since his ouster in a parliamentary vote of no-confidence last April, Khan has been holding street protests and campaigning for early elections in the country. Elahi, a former chief minister of Punjab, has emerged as a key ally in Khan’s movement and for formally appointed as the president of his opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party in March.
Since Khan’s ouster, many of his key aides have had cases registered against them and been arrested, moves that the party has described as a witch hunt, accusing the ruling coalition of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of launching a crackdown against the PTI and even sanctioning custodial torture of its members. The government denies this. Khan and Elahi have both had several cases lodged against them in recent months, including on charges of terrorism and corruption.
“The anti-corruption and police raids at Parvez Elahi’s residence tantamount to his harassment and political victimization at the behest of the government,” Rawn told Arab News on Tuesday.
He said the anti-corruption establishment had registered three cases against Elahi, which were “all baseless and concocted.” One of the cases relates to corruption charges worth Rs120 million by the Punjab Anti-Corruption Establishment.
The department did not respond to calls seeking comments for this story.
The anti-corruption establishment, Rawn said, was “trespassing its legal mandate” by conducting raids at the residences of “an innocent citizen” as the department was required to first initiate an inquiry and gather evidence and only attempt to arrest a suspect if he or she refused to cooperate with the inquiry.
“They register FIR [police case] on flimsy grounds and start raiding the houses the very next hour,” he said. “This is illegal and unconstitutional.”
Elahi’s son, Rasikh Elahi, on Tuesday moved the Lahore High Court against the raids, urging the court to stop authorities from arresting his father until a detailed report on all the cases was submitted. The Lahore High Court subsequently directed the Punjab police chief and the director general of the Punjab Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) to submit a detailed report regarding the late-night raids at Elahi’s home. The court however also rejected the petition disallowing police from arresting Elahi.
“We hope the anti-corruption and Punjab police officials will now refrain from raids in a bid to arrest Parvez Elahi before submitting a report of all the cases in the court,” Rawn said.
“Parvez Elahi is willing to join the inquiry in all cases registered against him, so the authorities should stop harassing him and his other family members.”