Trending Discussions
Meanwhile, a local court exonerated four accused of passport scam after FIA took the plea in the court that all the accused were innocent.
FIA would go to Interpol for the arrest of Muhammad Ali Asad, sources in the agency stated.
FIA officer seeking anonymity claimed that the drama was staged only to defame Pakistan and Asad provided fake information to passport office staff.
It is worth mentioning here that FIA had arrested nine officials of Directorate General of Immigration and Passport and NADRA, including a Deputy Director from the passport office Garden Town and five female staffers of NADRA Baghbanpura, who were allegedly involved in producing fake Computerised National Identity Cards (CNICs) and passports against heavy gratification.
The scam came to surface after a British tabloid, The Sun, reported that a crime ring in Pakistan was offering to provide fake passports and visas, as well as help smuggle bogus individuals into Olympic venues in London, posing as members of athletes’ support teams.
Earlier, FIA had arrested Acting Deputy Director Passport Shahid Iqbal and others, five female staffers of NADRA office including Rozeena, Rukhsana, Sumaira, Uzma and Qudsia but later released them.
Asif, Wasif, Ghaffar Ali (UDC) and Muhammad Fahim (DEO) were freed by court on Monday.
A senior official of NADRA on condition of anonymity said the issuance of fake CNIC was not a big scam since “we deal with similar matter cases off and on and register cases against the accused.” It is worth mentioning that some five years back, there were 22,000 FIRs registered against applicants with different police stations of country, who attempted to get fake CNICs issued in their favour, said former NADRA Chairman Saleem Moeen, while talking to The Nation.
The NADRA official said the case was only being projected due to links with the London Olympics; otherwise; it could gone unheard with the Pakistani authorities. “There will be at least 3,000 such fake cases with the NADRA office, if the matter is thoroughly investigated,” said sources in the NADRA vigilance section. Now after thorough probe FIA has declared innocent, four accused and registered a case against Muhammad Ali Asad as main accused.
