A court in Lahore acquitted on Wednesday Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shahbaz Sharf in the Rs16 billion money laundering case.

In its verdict, the court stated that there was insufficient evidence in the challan submitted by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

In today’s hearing, the counsel of the PMLN leader had requested the court to acquit the duo over the absence of evidence.

Following completion of arguments, the court reserved the verdict and took a break.

The Federal Investigation Agency had booked Shehbaz and his two sons, Hamza and Suleman, in November 2020 under Sections 419, 420, 468, 471, 34 and 109 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, read with Section 3/4 of Anti-Money Laundering Act.

In today’s heairng, the agency told the court that no direct transaction had been made in the bank accounts of PM Shehbaz and his son from benami accounts.

Advocate Amjad Pervez, who represented PM Shehbaz and his son Hamza, requested the court on Wednesday to grant the prime minister another exemption from hearing because of his unavoidable official engagements. The court had approved a similar request the other day from PMLQ’s Moonis Elahi.

The prime minister and Hamza Shehbaz did not appear before the court on Wednesday and a legal team submitted separate applications for their exemption from personal appearance for one-day.The court was requested to exempt the prime minister and his son as the premier could not appear due to his official engagements whereas Hamza Shehbaz had back pain.

During the proceedings, Advocate Amjad Pervaiz stated that the written arguments had also been submitted in the court.

He submitted that the case was made on the basis of malafide intention, adding that no amount was transferred in the accounts of Shehbaz Sharif or Hamza Shehbaz.

He further submitted that as per the law, the prosecution had to prove its case, whereas the prosecution could not present any evidence on the charge of bribery.

The defence counsel submitted that he had never seen such a case in his career where the prosecution was contesting the case without evidence.

However, FIA Prosecutor Farooq Bajwa submitted that accused Masroor Anwar used to operate the account of Shehbaz Sharif.

Amjad Pervaiz submitted that it was against the facts as Masroor Anwar never operated the account of Shehbaz Sharif.

The FIA prosecutor submitted that all benami accounts were operated by employees of Ramzan Sugar Mills.

The defence counsel replied that the record of the case had been compiled during previous government tenure.

The FIA prosecutor submitted that Gulzar Ahmad’s account continued to be operated even after his death, adding that Masroor Anwar made transactions from accounts of Shehbaz Sharif and Gulzar Ahmad.

At this, the court questioned the FIA prosecutor whether he had any evidence or record in this regard.

To which, the prosecutor replied that there was no evidence of this on record.

Subsequently, the court, after hearing detailed arguments of the parties, reserved its verdict on the acquittal applications, which would be announced later.