The Lahore High Court (LHC) has granted pre-arrest bail to two men accused in a property fraud case, ruling that merely signing a property agreement as a witness does not automatically make a person liable for offences such as forgery or cheating.
Justice Tariq Saleem Sheikh issued the detailed nine-page judgment while hearing petitions filed by Ansar Ali and another accused in connection with an FIR registered at Harbanspura Police Station under various fraud-related provisions.
According to the complainant, the accused introduced themselves as property dealers and facilitated the sale of a residential plot through a man who allegedly impersonated the property’s lawful owner. Believing the transaction to be genuine, the complainant said he paid Rs6.4 million to the impersonator and later invested an additional Rs4 million in constructing a house before discovering that the real owner had no involvement in the sale.
During the proceedings, the petitioners argued that they had only signed the agreement as witnesses and were not involved in the financial transaction. They maintained that the complainant dealt directly with the individual posing as the owner and that they neither received any money nor gained any benefit from the sale.
The complainant argued that video footage showed the accused present when the payment was made. However, after reviewing the evidence, the court observed that the footage only showed cash being counted and did not establish that the petitioners had knowledge of any alleged fraud or actively participated in the transaction.
Justice Sheikh further noted that investigators had failed to produce prima facie evidence linking the petitioners to the preparation or procurement of forged documents. The court also held that the allegation that the payment took place at the accused’s office, by itself, was insufficient to justify their arrest.
The judgment emphasized that an offence of cheating requires proof that the accused possessed dishonest intent from the very beginning of the transaction. In the absence of such evidence, the court found no valid grounds to deny pre-arrest bail.
Concluding that custodial interrogation would not serve any meaningful investigative purpose, the court confirmed the interim pre-arrest bail granted to both petitioners, subject to each furnishing surety bonds worth Rs200,000.
