A Karachi court has granted the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) a four-day remand of Iqrar ul Hassan, chief of the Pakistan Awam Raj Tehreek and a television presenter, who was arrested in Lahore.
Iqrar was produced before a judicial magistrate at Karachi’s City Court on Tuesday, a day after he was arrested in Lahore’s Defence Housing Authority (DHA). The agency sought his remand, which the court approved. After the hearing, the agency’s team returned him to a cell.
Case 101/2026 registered with NCCIA
According to officials, a case numbered 101/2026 has been registered against Iqrar with the NCCIA. The agency had not publicly confirmed the arrest when his family said the previous day that he had been taken from their residence in Lahore.
His wife, Farah Iqrar, said the family did not know why he had been detained. She said they contacted the NCCIA police station but could not obtain information about his whereabouts or the circumstances of the incident.
Family describes night-time raid at home
Farah alleged that a group of men arrived at their residence at night and demanded that Iqrar come outside. “We were asleep when we heard loud voices from outside saying, ‘Bring Iqrar out, otherwise we will break everything’,” she said.
She alleged that the men climbed over the boundary wall, pushed her and took Iqrar away. According to her account, two men held him while others seized mobile phones and a laptop. She also said the men took the CCTV cameras and her phone when she tried to record the incident.
Television anchor Waseem Badami had also said, in a social media post, that information about Iqrar’s whereabouts was not available following the reported detention. It remained unclear where he was being held.
