Islamabad-The Islamabad High Court Friday turned down bail plea of anchorperson Dr Shahid Masood in Pakistan Television (PTV) corruption case.

A single bench of IHC comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani conducted hearing of the petition challenging the special judge central’s judgment of rejecting pre-arrest bail of Dr Shahid through his counsel Shah Khawar Advocate and rejected the same after hearing the argument of both sides.

During the court proceedings, Masood’s counsel Shah Khawar adopted before the court that the anchor had not been nominated in the first information report lodged for the case.

On the other hand, Pakistan Television’s lawyer Mohammad Nazeer Jawad Advocate informed the court that Kashif Rabbani was also an accused in the case, however, he had returned more than Rs10m after his bail was denied.

Similarly, he added that Roshan Mustafa Gillani, another accused, also returned Rs8m. Both Rabbani and Gillani had said that the remaining amount was to be returned by Masood.

After hearing arguments from both the sides, the judge dismissed the anchor’s plea for a pre-arrest bail.

Earlier, special judge Kamran Basharat Mufti had turned down his pre-arrest bail on October 25.

After this verdict, the FIA is making efforts for Masood’s arrest but his counsel has filed the petition before the Islamabad High Court seeking his pre-arrest bail in the case related to alleged embezzlement in Pakistan Television (PTV) during his stint as the state-run Pakistan Television’s managing director and chairman.

The petitioner is allegedly involved in embezzlement of Rs37 million while acquiring the Pakistan Cricket Board’s (PCB) media rights in 2008 for which an agreement was signed with a fake company, namely M/S ISS.

The investigators in the case claimed that the amount had been released and it caused a loss of millions of dollars to Pakistan Television as the state-run television had failed to acquire the Pakistan Cricket Board’s media rights from 2008 to 2013.

According to the prosecution, Dr Shahid had allegedly signed an agreement with a fake company to negotiate with the PCB for grant of rights to PTV for coverage of matches played in Pakistan. It said that because of the agreement PTV had to face heavy financial losses.

In the petition seeking pre-bail arrest, the petitioner adopted that he was not nominated in the First Information Report (FIR) registered in this case.

He added that if he was arrested he would suffer an irreparable loss to his repute and health and requested the court to grant him bail till adjudication of the complaint filed against him by the FIA before the special judge central.