Islamabad court grants two-day transit remand for Agha Siraj Durrani

An accountability court in Islamabad has granted two-day transit remand of Sindh Assembly speaker Agha Siraj Durrani. He was arrested by the National Accountability Bureau outside Supreme Court on Friday.

The PPP leader has been given time to travel to Karachi from Islamabad where he will be taken to jail.

Durrani has been accused of accumulating assets worth Rs1.6 billion, which according to NAB are beyond his known sources of income. On December 3, he requested the top court for pre-arrest bail.

A three-member bench rejected his plea and instructed him to surrender before NAB. “[The] Supreme Court cannot conduct a hearing on this plea without the high court’s verdict,” Justice Mansoor Ali Shah ruled. “You must have been in jail if SHC had rejected your bail plea. Why should the court offer you leniency when you didn’t surrender to the police?”

The court then adjourned the hearing for a week. It will be heard by Justice Umar Ata Bandial.

Durrani was arrested in 2019. Earlier, in October, the Sindh High Court rejected his bail after which the PPP leader went to the apex court.

After the orders were passed, NAB raided his residence to arrest him but failed to do so because of resistance from the politician’s guards. Durrani then filed an appeal in the apex court.

The PPP leader was the Sindh local government minister from 2008 to 2013 and then appointed Sindh Assembly speaker in 2013, a position he holds to date.