ISLAMABAD: The Accountability Court on Thursday reserved its judgement on the pleas of the accused in the Pink Residency reference in which they challenged the territorial jurisdiction of the court in view of the amendments made by the coalition government to the NAB law.

Accountability Court-II judge, Nasir Javed Rana, while hearing the case reserved the verdict after both the defence and the prosecution completed their arguments on the applications filed by the accused of Pink Residency case regarding the illegal regularisation of land against Omni Group’s Abdul Ghani Majid and others, in which, they challenged the jurisdiction of the NAB court under the National Accountability (Amendment) Act, 2022 till February 7.

Defence counsel, while arguing before the court, said the Pink Residency reference didn’t fall under the jurisdiction of the court after the amendments in the NAB law.

The NAB filed a Pink Residency case against Omni Group Abdul Ghani Majid and 16 others.

The reference pertains to a project, “Pink Residency” in Karachi’s Gulistan-e-Jauhar area.

The accused had been allegedly involved in the illegal regularisation of two plots in Gulistan-e-Jauhar.

One of the plots measured 23 acres of land, while the other was seven acres. The anti-graft body has alleged that financial transactions related to the illegally-regularised plots were conducted through fake bank accounts.

The NAB estimates that the illegal land regularisation and consequent sale caused a loss of Rs4 billion to the national exchequer.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023