In response to an article packed with false allegations against the company, Graana.com has filed a defamation case of Rs. 1 billion in court against The Pakistan Daily & self-proclaimed journalist Hamza Azhar Salam.
Graana.com, Pakistan’s #1 online real estate marketplace, maintains that the news platform is deliberately undermining the company’s reputation to score political points and trigger an unnecessary media spectacle. The accusations revolve around how the success of the company was enabled by Directors Farhan Javed and Arslan Javed’s close connections with Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). The article, however, stays mum on the fact that the business was set up and saw its early success when Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) was in power. The company contends that it enjoys cordial relations with prominent figures of many political parties of Pakistan – a norm for private businesses in the country – which greatly dilutes the allegation.
It is pertinent to state that Hamza Azhar Salam, the journalist behind the said article, had published a similar piece maligning the company’s image a year before, on 21st May 2021. After multiple blackmail attempts on his part, he agreed to delete the article after he received a notice from the court. According to senior representatives of the company, he was on a spree of running from court proceedings and resorted to a series of calls to beg for an out-of-court-settlement. Graana.com eventually dropped the case after receiving assurances that he won’t endorse such claims again. As a result, the article was taken down.
A second article was published – and deleted — yet again on 26th May 2021, proving his malafide intent and continuous attempts to make baseless assertions against the company’s name, thus compromising professional journalism ethics.
After insisting that he has done further research, Hamza Azhar Salam has now published yet another article as a vehement and unpleasant attack. This dissemination of false information, after a history of biases, is also evident of links to political indictment.
His Twitter post received a huge backlash from readers for not substantiating these mass allegations.
Graana.com, a company that aims to transform Pakistan’s real estate processes by promising transparency and reliability, is committed to defending itself against such vitriol. It values brand loyalty as its main growth driver and, hence, does not want such reckless acts of ill intent to tarnish its carefully-built standing in the real estate sector.
