Abid Boxer gets bail in 10 cases, vows to ‘blow lid off many secrets’

• Notorious ‘encounter specialist’ claims cases against him are ‘baseless’

LAHORE: A sessions court on Friday granted bail to infamous former police inspector Abid Hussain, also known as Abid ‘Boxer’, who has been named in several cases of murder, attempted murder and land grabbing in Punjab.

Abid was given interim bail in 10 cases, including two robbery cases and a murder case, after he submitted surety bonds worth Rs100,000 each till August 4.

After the Lahore High Court (LHC) was informed on Monday that Boxer had been extradited to Pakistan from UAE in February, the accused, accompanied by his attorney, showed up in the court of Additional Sessions Judge Rehmat Ali.

Boxer’s lawyer claimed that the cases against his client are “baseless” and that the former ‘encounter specialist’ has been targeted as part of a “vindictive” campaign. He requested that the court grant Boxer interim bail — a request the court agreed to.

Speaking to the media outside the courtroom, Boxer said that he was happy to return to the country after 11 years and added that he would “blow the lid off many secrets”.

Earlier on Thursday, a video message was released in which the former inspector had alleged that former Punjab chief minister (CM) Shehbaz Sharif had false cases registered against him because he had a land dispute with his uncle.

Abid was arrested earlier this year from the United Arab Emirates (UAE). He is accused of indulging in extra-judicial killings among other crimes.

WHO IS ABID BOXER?

Abid Hussain joined the police department in 1988 as an assistant sub-inspector. He was later promoted to the rank of inspector. He fled Pakistan in 2008 after the police lodged cases against him under murder, attempted murder, fraud and forgery charges.

The murder case that forced Hussain to flee Pakistan was lodged against him at Qila Gujjar Singh police station after the death of a retired army brigadier, Naseem Ashraf. Ashraf’s wife had lodged the case accusing the former inspector of killing her husband. She alleged that Hussain had wanted to grab a cinema owned by the retired brigadier in 2008.

The complainant later died under mysterious circumstances and it was suspected that she too was killed at the behest of Boxer.

In February, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan had alleged that the former inspector had confessed to killing people on the instructions of Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif.

“Police never kill people until and unless a chief minister orders or grants permission to kill people,” he had quoted Abid as saying.

“Abid Boxer fled to Dubai as Shahbaz Sharif wanted to kill him because he could expose the chief minister,” Khan had alleged.