THE PECA ORDINANCE UNDER SECTION 20

By: Hassan Zubair

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) ordered the government officials not to make arrests under section 20 of the recently annunciate Prevention of Electronic crimes (amendment) Act of Ordinance 2022. Recently the Arrest of Mohsin Baig (businessmen) who quoted a page from the book written by Reham Khan  was arrested by the FIA officials in Islamabad. The intriguing part of this whole scenario proved that he was a target of prejudice and hatred by Pakistani government . Minister Murad Saeed holds a grip on ministry of communication . He filed a F.I.R against Mohsin Baig in Lahore at 9:00 AM , Tuesday. Exactly at 9:30 AM Mohsin Baig was arrested from his house in Islamabad . It was clear to public that FIA is operating under the influence of Minister Murad Saeed . The director of FIA was scolded by Justice Minallah in IHC . FIA was always considered a renowned agency which holds public safety as tier one, priority . Fortunately Mohsin Baig’s arrest bred certain situation for others too.

This ordinance needed to be revised a long time ago .There was a severe need of such act because cyber crime has been spreading its monotony all across Pakistan. Therefore President Dr. Arif Alvi declared an ordinance on February 20th to amend the PECA act 2016. According to that ordinance online defamation ,abusing and fake news uploaders will be committing a punishable offence .After the amendment , the jail time has been increased from three years to five years along with fine of 100,000 without the possibility of early payroll or bail . therefore by this ordinance FIA has been given more powers and authenticity in order to cater the cyber crime more affectively and by fair means of evidence hunt against that person .