PML-N MPA Saqib Chadhar secures interim bail after being booked for allegedly harassing actor Momina Iqbal

LAHORE: A day after the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) registered a case against PML-N MPA Saqib Chadhar for allegedly harassing television actor Momina Iqbal, the lawmaker secured interim pre-arrest bail from a Lahore court on Friday. Additional District and Sessions Judge Irfan Ahmad Sheikh approved to the bail after hearing Chadhar’s plea. During the hearing, Chadhar appeared before the court along with his counsel, Mian Ali Ashfaq. The judge barred the NCCIA from arresting Chadhar till June 24 and directed the NCCIA to submit the case record at the next hearing. NCCIA case On Thursday, the NCCIA registered a case against Chadhar on Iqbal’s complaint under Sections 3 (unauthorised access to information system or data), 4 (unauthorized copying or transmission of data), 21 (offences against modesty of a natural person and minor) and 24 (cyber stalking) of the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, read with Sections 506 (punishment for criminal intimidation), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender), 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) and 109 (punishment for abetment if the act abetted is committed in consequence and where no express provision is made for its punishment) of the Pakistan Penal Code. According to the first information report (FIR), a copy of which is available with Dawn, Iqbal alleged in her complaint that Chadhar, his wife and their “known and unknown associates have waged a sustained campaign of cyber harassment, stalking, criminal intimidation, blackmailing, defamation, unlawful surveillance, and threats against her and her family”. She also alleged that after rejecting Chadhar’s marriage proposal upon discovering his existing marriage, the he “retaliated with repeated threats, attempts to access her private data, sending violent content, and blackmailing via her private videos”. “The accused (Chadhar) allegedly defamed her socially and pro