It began as one of Pakistan’s greatest business success stories: a technology empire worth over $2 billion, built from Pakistan and expanded across the world by a man celebrated as the country’s most successful tech entrepreneur. Today, that empire has been reduced to barely $150 million, its founder pushed out of his own company, and a legal battle now unfolding in Pakistan’s Supreme Court that has become a test case not just for corporate justice, but for the future of foreign investment in Pakistan. At the centre of it all is Zia Chishti — Sitara-e-Imtiaz recipient, founder of Align, TRG, and Afiniti, and for 25 years one of the loudest global advocates for Pakistan as a business destination.

According to a document shared by Chishti, he has not only built three companies each valued at over $1 billion but personally channelled more than $500 million of investment into Pakistan, creating over 10,000 jobs in the country. His advisory board at its peak included former Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom, Spain, France, and Italy, as well as U.S. Senators, Governors, and senior business figures — a global network few Pakistanis in the private sector have ever commanded. For years, he promoted Pakistan at the World Economic Forum, in Silicon Valley, in Washington, and in European capitals as a rising player in technology and IT-enabled services.

But in November 2021, at a moment when TRG’s valuation exceeded $2 billion, Chishti was hit with accusations of harassment and assault by an employee during a U.S. congressional hearing. The allegations immediately triggered global headlines. According to Chishti, those accusations were later proven false in legal proceedings in both Pakistan and the United Kingdom, where the publishers were forced to issue apologies and pay significant damages. However, at the time, before he had cleared his name, he stepped down as Chairman of TRG to shield the company from reputational harm — a decision that would open the door to what he now describes as a “corporate hijacking.”

In his absence, Chishti’s two closest lieutenants, Mohammed Khaishgi and Hasnain Aslam, had promised they would continue to run TRG on his instructions until he returned. Instead, according to the document, they immediately reneged, seized control of the company, and began restructuring it without his involvement. What followed was one of the fastest corporate collapses in recent Pakistani history: a $2 billion company falling to roughly $150 million in value. During the same period, Chishti alleges, Khaishgi and Aslam personally extracted more than $30 million from TRG and spent another $40 million on legal fees in efforts to retain control of the company.

The most serious allegation concerns $150 million of TRG funds, which Chishti says were moved into an offshore shell company, and then used to secretly buy TRG’s own shares on the market — a move designed, he claims, to prevent him from regaining control even though he and his allies hold more than 43% ownership, while those running the company hold less than 0.1%. In June 2025, the Sindh High Court ruled that the offshore share-buying scheme was fraudulent, ordered that the illegally purchased shares be returned to TRG itself, and directed that the company immediately hold board elections.

Instead of complying, Khaishgi and Aslam filed an appeal in the Supreme Court of Pakistan, which has suspended the High Court’s ruling. According to Chishti, the delay is not legal — it is political. He alleges that one of the beneficiaries of the scheme, Hasnain Aslam, is a cousin of senior politician Ayaz Sadiq, who has engaged prominent lawyers Ahsan Bhoon and Azam Tarar to influence the Supreme Court’s handling of the case by exerting pressure on judges and the Registrar’s office. Chishti argues that the case must now be decided “purely on the merits, and by judges specialising in corporate law,” warning that any manipulation would send a devastating message to global investors.

The stakes extend far beyond a single company. According to the document, this case is being closely watched by private-sector investors and multinationals who view it as a bellwether for whether Pakistan is capable of upholding contractual rights and protecting capital. The document outlines three national consequences: first, a decision on the merits will reassure global markets and help Pakistan attract large-scale foreign investment, while a decision influenced by politics would do the opposite. Second, if the courts uphold the High Court ruling, the remaining $150 million being held offshore will immediately return to Pakistan. Third, Chishti argues that if he regains control of TRG, he can once again scale Pakistan’s IT and business-process exports by more than $1 billion a year — based on his proven record of building billion-dollar firms from Pakistan before.

Chishti says he stepped aside in 2021 to save his company from bad publicity, believing the people he trusted would act in good faith until his name was cleared, but instead, in his words, “they betrayed that trust, seized the company, and the company has paid the price.” What was once a story of Pakistan’s global technology rise has become a story of financial extraction, offshore money, political interference, and a legal battle now frozen inside the country’s highest court.

With elections stalled, the company’s value destroyed, and $150 million still outside Pakistan, the future of TRG — and the credibility of Pakistan’s business environment — now rests with the Supreme Court. The question is no longer whether Zia Chishti will return to his company. It is whether Pakistan is willing to protect the founders who build value for the country, or the insiders who strip that value for themselves.

For Pakistan’s global investors, the signal from this case will be decisive. If the courts uphold the law, capital will return. If they do not, the world will draw its own conclusions — and the country may lose not just a company, but one of the only entrepreneurs who proved that Pakistan could build billion-dollar technology firms on the world stage.