Pakistan’s ex-information minister Fawad Chaudhry released from jail

Islamabad: Former information minister and senior Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Fawad Chaudhry was released from jail on Wednesday after a court granted him bail in a sedition case.

Chaudhry, 52, a close aide of former prime minister Imran Khan, was arrested from his residence in Lahore last week in a pre-dawn raid after a case was registered against him at Islamabad’s Kohsar Police Station on the complaint of the Secretary Election Commission of Pakistan for “threatening” the electoral body’s members and their families.

Additional sessions court Judge Faizan Gilani granted bail to Chaudhry in the sedition case against a surety bond of Rs20,000.

The judge said that he accepted the bail on the condition that Chaudhry would not repeat his allegation that led to his arrest and the case. “I am granting the bail on the condition that Fawad Chaudhry does not repeat such remarks,” he remarked.

Chaudhry was later released from the Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi.

“I said in court as well. I stand by all that I said, and I will not back down,” he said in his brief address to the party workers who had gathered outside the prison to welcome him.

He also said that he did not speak against any institution. “I never talk against the institutions. I am the biggest supporter of our institutions, and I never said anything against them. That is why I reiterate that whatever I said was right,” he said.

A judicial magistrate had sent him to jail on Monday on a 14-day judicial remand by rejecting a police request for custody to probe him in the case.

Chaudhry is facing sedition charges for publicly “threatening” the members of the election commission.

The detained PTI spokesperson has been vocal in highlighting the party policy and objectives as enunciated by the party chief Imran Khan.

The PTI, which rejected his arrest as politically motivated, had been demanding his release.