ISLAMABAD (DNA) – The accountability court will indict former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf and other accused persons in the rental power projects (RPPs) scam case on February 8.

Reportedly, the accountability court’s judge Arshad Malik presided over the hearing of the case and subsequently ordered all accused persons to appear before the court on the next hearing.

The court will approve chargesheet against the accused persons on three RPPs including Reshma Power Generation (Pvt) Limited, Gulf Rental Power Pvt Ltd and Young Gen Power Ltd.

The judge expressed annoyance over the delay in proceedings of the case and inquired about its reasons from the prosecution.

“The delay has been caused due to some legal reasons,” the prosecution responded.

Meanwhile, Raja’s defence pleaded with the court for permanent exemption of his client’s appearance in the case.

However, Justice Arshad replied that the matter would be considered after chargesheet was produced by the NAB.

The RPPs case is about private power companies that faced allegations of having received more than Rs22 billion mobilisation advance from the government to commission the projects, but failed to set up the plants. A few of them had set up the plants, but only after an inordinate delay.

Former PM Ashraf has also been accused for misusing his authority during his tenure as the minister for water and power to get approval from the Economic Coordination Committee of the cabinet for an increase in the down payment to the rental power companies from 7 to 14 per cent, amounting to about Rs22bn.