Court rejects plea by Dar’s wife against auction of Lahore house – Pakistan

An accountability court in Islamabad on Thursday rejected a statement against the auction of the property of former finance minister Ishaq Dar in Gulberg Lahore.

The petition was filed by Dar's wife, Tabassum.

The accountability court judge, Mohammad Bashir, announced the decision and said the petitioner could not justify her claim that Dar had given her the house. The court also rejected his request for access to a video of a raid on the property.

However, the court postponed the decision on its request for permission to withdraw money from Dar's accounts. The court will announce the decision on November 13.

Following the submission of a reference against Dar in the accountability court in September last year, the National Office of Accountability had confiscated all of Dar's movable and immovable property, including a house in Gulberg III, Lahore; three plots in the Al Falah Housing Society, Lahore; six acres of land in Islamabad; a plot of two channels in the Parliamentary Enclave, Islamabad; a plot in the Senate Housing Cooperative Society, Islamabad; a plot that measures two kanals and another of nine marlas in Islamabad and six vehicles.

The office said that Dar had acquired on his behalf and / or on behalf of the assets of his dependents worth Rs831.7m, which was disproportionate to his known sources of income.

On October 2, 2018, Judge Bashir had attached Dar's properties to the Punjab government and allowed his auction according to the rules.

The same month, Tabassum filed an application in the accountability court against the confiscation of her husband's property after a fugitive was declared in the reference filed by NAB.

She had argued that her husband had verbally given her the property on February 14, 1989, instead of the amount of her dowry. She said that since she had accepted the gift and resided there, NAB had wrongly shown the property as an asset of Dar. She had asked the court to cancel the order for the auction of the property.

According to NAB's response, said house was registered in the name of Dar in the income register and has not yet been transferred to the name of his spouse.