ISLAMABAD: Finance Minister Ishaq Dar was indicted on Wednesday by the accountability court hearing the Supreme Court-directed corruption reference against him. Dar denied all charges and vowed to prove his innocence in court. The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) submitted a list of 28 witnesses, which it will now begin to produce in court at the next hearing on October 4. The court rejected an application filed by Dar requesting exemption from personal attendance in court hearings and said the case would be heard on a day-to-day basis after Muharram holidays. Dar reached the court a little before 9am amid tight security arrangements and faced trouble getting into the court complex owing to the huge crowd. Dar then got back into his vehicle as the gates of the complex were still shut. Police officials feared that if they opened the gates the huge crowd would get into the complex. Later, security officials escorted Dar to the court complex from its rear gate. The media was disallowed from entering the premises, as were lawyers and litigants. However, a number of lawyers were seen climbing over the gate to enter the complex. Once the charges against the finance minister were read out by Judge Mohammad Bashir, Dar refused to accept the charges. According to sources, Dar vowed in the court that his assets are according to his means, saying he will prove his innocence. Dar pleaded the court to grant him exemption from appearance in the case as the charges have been levelled. However, NAB opposed Dar's plea and the court did not issue any order on it. Dar’s counsel, Amjad Pervez, pleaded that his client did not receive the notice the court usually issues seven days prior to the indictment, but the judge told him that since his client had not appeared in the first hearing on Sept 19, this could be taken to mean that he was allowed the seven-day notice period. The court then ordered NAB to produce its witnesses and adjourned the hearing until October 4. Speaking to the media after the hearing, state minister Tariq Fazl Chaudhry lamented that in such cases the accused are usually indicted after seven days from giving the reference copy. He said two of the 16 witnesses of NAB, bank officials from Lahore, have been summoned for the next hearing. In response to a question, he said, "We didn’t stop media from coming in the courtroom". The corruption reference, pertaining to Dar's owning assets that are disproportionate to his known sources of income, was filed by the National Accountability Bureau in light of the Supreme Court's July 28 judgment in the Panama Papers case. After skipping his first hearing, for which a summons had been issued, Dar appeared in court on Monday after bailable warrants for his arrest had been issued to ensure his presence. INP
