- Sanaullah recalls exchange with Bajwa, Faiz Hamid during briefing
- PM’s adviser says ANF case filed on Gen (retd) Bajwa’s instructions.
- Serving officer can’t act without army chief’s consent: Sanaullah.
Prime Minister’s Adviser on Political Affairs Rana Sanaullah has alleged that former army chief Gen (retd) Qamar Javed Bajwa directed the registration of a narcotics case against him back in 2019.
Sanaullah was arrested in July 2019 during the PTI government after the ANF claimed it recovered 15kg of heroin from his vehicle, and was later granted bail by the Lahore High Court (LHC).
Speaking in a podcast, Sanaullah recalled an exchange with Gen Bajwa and former spymaster Hamid, in which the ex-army chief made remarks about the former’s physical condition.
“Gen Bajwa said, ‘Rana, you have become very fat. You were very smart in jail. Faiz, make Rana sahib smart again,’” he said.
Sanaullah said he responded by telling the former army chief that the case against him had been initiated on his instructions. “I told Bajwa that the case against me was made at your behest. May Allah hold you accountable for it in this world,” he added.
He also rejected the notion that serving military officers could act independently of the army chief, saying it was impossible for an in-service officer to fabricate a false case without approval.
“It is not possible for a serving officer to register a false case without the army chief’s consent and not face a court martial the next day,” he said.
The prime minister’s adviser further alleged that during the tenure of PTI founder Imran Khan, state affairs were effectively run with the consent of Bajwa, Hamid.
‘No probe underway against Bajwa’
Meanwhile, following the conviction of ex-ISI chief, certain political and media circles have begun speculating about the possibility of legal action against Qamar Bajwa.
However, informed sources have dismissed such claims, stating that there is neither any probe nor any proceeding underway against Gen (retd) Bajwa, The News reported on Sunday.
The Field General Court Martial (FGCM) sentenced the former spymaster to 14 years of rigorous imprisonment for engaging in political activities, violating the Official Secrets Act, misusing authority and causing wrongful loss to persons, according to a statement issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) on December 11.
Sources said the gossip being circulated in some quarters is baseless. According to them, the military accountability process that culminated in the conviction of the former spymaster was strictly evidence-based and confined to his individual actions, with no material linking the former army chief to the case.
Instead, sources indicate that after the army concluded the accountability process against one of its own senior officers, expectations are growing that accountability could extend beyond the military domain.
Judges, bureaucrats, politicians and even media persons who allegedly played roles in the past political engineering or overstepped constitutional and legal limits may come under scrutiny in the days to come.
