The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has reinitiated investigation into money laundering charges against Hanif Kalia and Munaf Khanani (K&K), registered with FIA, Abbottabad. Sources said that the reinvestigation has been ordered because the investigation officer had managed to exclude the names of Hanif Kalia and Munaf Khanani from the final Investigation Report, submitted in court, registered by FIA Abbottabad circle.
They said that the names of K&K were excluded from the Challan despite their names were included in the Confidential Final Report (CFR). The FIA had registered three separate cases against K&K in 2008--in Karachi, Lahore and Abbottabad.
It is learnt that the investigating agency has called for an explanation from Assistant Director Tariq Pervez who allegedly excluded the names of Munaf Khanani and Hanif Kalia from the final challan submitted in court. These challans were submitted deliberately late on September 22, 2010 in the court despite the fact that permission for submission of Challan was granted on April 28, 2010.
In August 2008, FIA team raided the franchise office of K&Ks located at GT Road Haripur, seized their computers, catalogues, and receipts and arrested two employees. The reason for the raid: the franchise, co-owned by Tariq Aziz and Wajid Aziz, was operating despite the cancellation of license by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
In FIR, No FIR 28/2008, the investigation officer nominated Javed Khanani, Munaf Kalia, Tariq Aziz and Wajid Aziz as accused under the money laundering law. The investigation officer also obtained arrest warrant for remand of Javed Khanani and Munaf Kalia. They were accused under Sections 5/8, 22/23 Foreign Exchange Regulation Act 1947 & Sections 7, 8, 20 Prevention of Electronic Crimes Ordinance 2007.
Director FIA Punjab Inam Ghani Director KPK in 2008 admitted that he had written a letter to Director FIA Karachi for arrest of Munaf Khanani and Hanif Kalia under the case registered in Abbottabad. The two accused Javed Khanani and Munaf Kalia are under arrest by Directorate of FIA Karachi in the money laundering case.
Sources said that both accused would only be available for questioning by FIA Abottabad after completion of court hearing in Karachi. During investigation, the hard discs of seized computers were sent to Special Investigation Group (SIG) for decoding. The decoding of computer hard discs showed that Khanani & Kalia International had created illegal unregistered online accounts to receive remittances. This www.pak.com online account is other than that of their official account, registered with the State Bank of Pakistan.
Investigations also showed 47 fictitious (with fake names) bank accounts in various branches of commercial banks. These fake accounts were being used for transactions of several million rupees on daily basis, again without the knowledge of SBP.
In May 2009 the inquiry officer (IO) was transferred to FIA headquarters and the case was handed over to Tariq Pervez, Assistant Director, FIA, Peshawar Circle. Tariq submitted the challan before the special court and excluded the names of Munaf Khanani and Hanif Kalia from money laundering case. Later on, Tariq was promoted to Acting Deputy Director, FIA, Immigration.
Director, FIA, KPK, Dr Suleman, has called an explanation from Tariq Pervez as to why he excluded the names of Munaf Khanani and Hanif Kalia from the challan when they were named in the FIR. Tariq has taken the plea that he had excluded the names of Munaf and Hanif due to lack of evidence. Director, KPK, recently posted Assistant Director Muhammad Naeem to FIA, Abbottabad, to reinvestigate and submit a new challan before the court after including the names of Munaf Khanani, Hanif Kalia.
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