A Rawalpindi civil court acquitted Atiqa Odho on Friday for a 9 year standing case in which she was suspect of carrying two liquor bottles in her baggage at the airport.
The court, in its judgement, said that there was no proof against Odho. The verdict was pronounced by Rawalipindi’s judicial magistrate Yasir Chaudhry.
Said case was remanded to the trial court in 2018 by the Supreme Court. The actress in 2017 had appealed the top court to intercede, claiming that all trial courts had rejected her application for acquittal on the grounds that the trial wasn’t over and that the matter would be decided after conclusion of the evidence of the suspect in her defense.
In 2011, Odho was held by the Airport Security Force at the Benazir Bhutto International Airport for supposedly carrying two liquor bottles in her baggage. She was freed soon after the interference of some ‘influential figures’.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry then took suo motu notice of her release and ordered the authorities to file a first information report of the occurrence.
Odho’s lawyer Barrister Ali Zafar contended that she had been implicated in a fabricated case as a consequence of the suo motu action, that too was based merely on news snippets.
He further said that the case against his client was fabricated and frivolous and after the prosecution’s deduction of its evidence, it was apparent that no case had been made against her.
