Pakistan’s capital was tense ahead of a planned rally by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Pakistan’s capital was tense on Sunday (September 8, 2024) ahead of a planned rally by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party to press the government for his release.

Mr. Khan has been in jail since his arrest on August 5, 2023. The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) rally is being held on a ground near the Sangjani Cattle Market in the suburbs of Islamabad.

The Islamabad district administration has already issued a no-objection certificate (NOC) for the rally, and preparations are in the final stages.

Also Read: Pakistan at risk of parochialism, says former PM Imran Khan

After the city administration revoked its no-objection certificate and sealed roads leading to the federal capital on August 22, the party put off its public gathering in Islamabad and rescheduled it for September 8.

PTI announced that the rally would begin at 2 p.m.. PTI Chairman Gohar Ali Khan said on Saturday (September 7) that the rally would be peaceful.

“Our rally will be peaceful, and we have an NOC. No obstacles should be placed in our way,” he said. It would be the first major rally by the PTI in Islamabad since the February 8 elections. The party wants to exert pressure on the government to release Khan who languishes in jail despite the courts either acquitting him or giving him bail in all cases he was convicted.

Mr. Khan has repeatedly shown a willingness to hold talks with the establishment while refusing to sit with the government. So far all his tactics have failed to get any relief. Mass protest is an option but his party has been facing pressure to avoid it.

Today’s rally is a test for both the government and the PTI as it will help them gauge the ground power swell for Mr. Khan and fine-tune their policies and tactics in the coming days.

However, the government was not taking any chances. It has put in place measures to curtail the free movement of participants and forestall any protest plan. It has blocked all major entries to Islamabad by placing shipping containers on roads.

Sources told PTI that the Islamabad administration prepared a security plan under which senior officers of the Islamabad Police would be deployed in different parts of the city.

The hospital administration has also been asked to be alert by the administration. The Metro bus service has been completely stopped in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

Meanwhile, President Asif Ali Zardari signed into law the Public Order and Peaceful Assembly Bill 2024 hours before the planned rally, instituting strict measures for unauthorised gatherings.

The new law introduces penalties for holding gatherings without permission in Islamabad, with violators facing up to three years in prison and fines. Repeat offenders could be sentenced to up to 10 years in jail.

Supporters of imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf distribute sweets to passersby to celebrates the Supreme Court decision in a case of reserved seats for women and minorities in the parliament, in Lahore, on July 12, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf will emerge as the largest party in Parliament with 109 seats after the Supreme Court on July 12 ruled that it is eligible for the allocation of reserved seats for women and minorities, according to a media report.

In a major legal victory for 71-year-old Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, a 13-member full bench of the apex court headed by Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa annulled the Peshawar High Court’s decision upholding the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) move to deny its share in reserved seats in the National Assembly and provincial assemblies.

The bench also declared the decision of the top electoral body “null and void”, terming it “against the Constitution of Pakistan”.

The PTI will emerge as the largest party in the National Assembly as its seats will likely soar from 86 to 109 after it gains 23 reserved seats, Geo News reported.

The Opposition alliance in the National Assembly will also surge to a strength of 120, the report said.

Currently, the combined opposition, including the PTI, has 97 members.

Khan’s party has 86 members in the lower house, 84 of whom are on board with the Suni Ittehad Council (SIC) and two independents — party leaders Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and Omar Ayub Khan.

With the majority seats of the PTI in the lower house of the legislature, the ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) will continue to occupy the simple majority with the strength of 209 members. The PML-N has a total of 108 members.

Major setback for the ruling coalition

The apex court’s ruling in the keenly awaited judgment is viewed as a major setback to Prime Minister Sharif’s ruling coalition, increasing pressure on it by changing the composition of the National Assembly and paving the way for the PTI’s return to Parliament.

“[The] withdrawal of election symbol cannot disqualify a political party from elections,” the court declared, referring to the election commission not allowing the PTI to use the cricket bat as its election symbol. “The PTI was and is a political party,” the bench ruled.

Khan, a cricketer-turned-politician, founded the PTI in 1996.

The dispute about the reserved seats was related to the rejection of a SIC plea by the ECP to award its share in the 70 reserved seats in the National Assembly and another 156 in the four provincial assemblies.

The PTI party could not contest the February 8 elections as the ECP rejected its intra-party elections and deprived it of its iconic ‘bat’ symbol for contesting the elections as a party.

Hence, it was not eligible to claim the seats reserved for women and minorities awarded to the winning parties based on proportional representation.

So its candidates, who had won independently but with the support of PTI, were asked by the party’s leadership to join the SIC to form a parliamentary party to claim reserved seats.

The joining of PTI lawmakers made the SIC prominent, which, otherwise, was a dormant entity.

The final ruling by the top court in the case may not change the current power structure, but changes in the overall number game in the assemblies may impact the law-making in the country.

Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Jailed former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party on June 23 reiterated its demand for Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja’s immediate resignation for failing to hold “free and fair” elections and protested against the “injustices” being committed against the party, according to media reports.

“Leaders of 71-year-old Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, along with other National Assembly members, led a protest rally from the Parliament to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on the Constitution Avenue in Islamabad,” The Express Tribune newspaper reported.

Led by Leader of Opposition and party leader Omar Ayub, the protesters demanded the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Raja and election commission members for alleged poll rigging.

The controversial February 8 general elections in Pakistan were marred with massive rigging allegations. During the rally, Mr. Ayub called for the immediate resignation of CEC Raja and other members of the ECP, alleging that the only job of the Election Commission was to conduct clean and transparent polls, but it failed to fulfil its constitutional duty, The News International newspaper reported.

“The protesters were stopped from reaching the electoral body’s central office, as large contingents of security personnel were deployed outside the ECP building,” the report said. Slogans were also chanted for the release of party founder and cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan.

Mr. Khan has been incarcerated in the high-security Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi since September last year. He was shifted to this prison from the District Jail Attock, where he had been lodged after his arrest on August 5, 2023, following his conviction in the Toshakhana case.

Addressing the rally, PTI chairman Barrister Gohar Khan said, “The doors of courts have been closed on Opposition leaders; our women are in jail, and history will remember them.” He said that it was a matter of regret that all the Parliamentarians were coming out on the streets and protesting for the release of PTI founder Khan,” the report said.

“Today, we have come out against this injustice. Our voice is not being heard in this House (Parliament). Whatever we said in the House, our voice was silenced. We want the women’s release. This is a clear violation of human rights,” he said.

Addressing the protesters, the party’s central leader, Asad Qaiser, said, “On May 9, we were targeted on the pretext that we are not negotiating with anyone. Our voice is not heard in Parliament, which amounts to our gross abuse.”

After the controversial general elections, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and Pakistan Peoples Party formed a coalition government after intense negotiations following a fractured poll verdict. Independent candidates – a majority backed by the PTI party – won 93 of the 265 National Assembly seats contested in the February 8 election.

File photo of former Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan.
| Photo Credit: PTI

An accountability court in Pakistan on May 15 adjourned the hearing of the £190 million corruption case against Imran Khan till May 17, citing “security concerns” at the high-security Adiala prison where the former Prime Minister is currently imprisoned, media reports said.

The 71-year-old Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder has been lodged at the high-security Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi since August last year.

The Islamabad accountability court accepted the request of the Adiala Jail’s superintendent to adjourn the hearing of the case against Mr. Khan due to ‘security concerns’, The Express Tribune newspaper reported.

The Court adjourned the hearing till May 17, it said.

In his request, the jail official cited reports received by the Punjab Home Department of the threat alerts on prisons in Punjab by banned organisations.

Asserting that the Adiala jail is the most sensitive prison in the province and houses more than 7,000 prisoners, the official said that criminals involved in serious crimes, including high-profile political entities, are also incarcerated there.

Security threats were also received for the Mianwali, Dera Ghazi Khan, Rawalpindi (Adiala) and Attock jails, said the request.

Following the reports, security was increased in and around the prison, and a mock exercise was also conducted by security forces there.

Surrounding areas were also being combed by security personnel, the paper said.

Also Read: Imran Khan | The cornered captain

On May 14, the Punjab Home Department imposed a ban on meeting of relatives and others with all prisoners in the Adiala Jail for three days owing to security concerns, the Dawn newspaper reported.

A ban on providing any items to prisoners was also imposed.

In March, the Punjab government banned Mr. Khan from holding any meetings, including with his family members, lawyers and party leaders for two weeks at the Adiala Jail.

The Al-Qadir Trust case is about the settlement of 190 million pounds, about ₹50 billion, which the U.K.’s National Crime Agency sent to Pakistan after recovering the amount from a Pakistani property tycoon.

Being the Prime Minister then, Mr. Khan, instead of depositing in the national treasury, allowed the businessman to use the amount to partly settle a fine of about ₹450 billion imposed by the Supreme Court some years ago.

Reportedly, the tycoon, in return, gifted about 57 acres of land to a trust set up by Mr. Khan and Bushra Bibi to establish the Al-Qadir University in the Sohawa area of the Jhelum district of Punjab.

In December 2023, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) initiated an investigation against the former cricketer-turned-politician, his wife and others in the case of alleged acquisition of hundreds of canals of land under the name of Al Qadir University Trust, resulting in a reported loss of 190 million pounds to the exchequer.

Since his removal from power in a no-confidence motion in April 2022, Mr. Khan has been convicted in at least four cases, including the cipher (secret diplomatic communication) case.

Islamabad:

Pakistan’s leading right-wing Islamic leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Monday came out in support of his erstwhile rival Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, saying the opposition party has the right to hold rallies and even form a government.

Rehman, the chief of his faction of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl (JUI-F), made a blistering speech in the National Assembly, slamming the powerful establishment for allegedly rigging the political system.

“It is the right of the PTI to hold a rally,” he said. “We also objected to the 2018 election and we object to this (February 8 polls) one too. If the 2018 poll was rigged, why is the current one not rigged?” he asked.

PTI leader Asad Qaiser had demanded the party’s right to organise a rally. “The demand of Asad Qaiser is correct and it is the right of PTI to hold a rally,” Rehman said in his speech.

Rehman urged the ruling coalition of the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) and the Pakistan Peoples Party to allow the PTI to form the government if it enjoyed a majority in the parliament.  

“Leave this power. Come and sit here [on the opposition benches], and if the PTI is indeed the larger group, then give them the government,” he said.

The cleric then expressed his dismay over the role of the establishment and bureaucracy in election and running the country.

“The establishment and bureaucracy had no role in achieving this country,” he said.

He alleged that the elections held on Feb 8 were not fair but flawed.

“What kind of election is this where the losers are not satisfied and the winners are upset?” he said.

He drew parallels with neighbouring India. “Just compare India and ourselves… both countries got independence on the same day. But today they (India) are dreaming of becoming a superpower and we are begging to avoid bankruptcy,” he said.

While India is inching closer to become a Global Superpower, Pakistan is begging before the world to save it from devastation.

[Pakistan’s Parliament] pic.twitter.com/i3ZNA3kQaN

— kanishka Dadhich (@KanishkaDadhich) April 29, 2024

He said that decisions are made by somebody else but politicians are blamed for the problems.

Rehman also lamented the failure to implement recommendations from the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII), emphasising the importance of upholding Islamic principles.

“We got the country in the name of Islam, but today we have become a secular state. Since 1973, not a single recommendation of the CII has been implemented. How can we be an Islamic country?” he said.

The CCI is a constitutional body set up to help Islamize the laws.

He also said that Pakistan was begging the International Monetary Fund to avoid bankruptcy.

pic.twitter.com/KGHZhhVB18

— Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman (@MoulanaOfficial) April 29, 2024

The JUI-F was the arch-rival of PTI and had spearheaded the move for the ouster of Imran Khan. After his downfall, JUI-F became part of the coalition government. However, he parted ways with the PML-N and PPP after the elections as he alleged that the polls were rigged to keep his party out of power.

It is believed by many that by supporting the PTI, the cleric is putting pressure on the establishment and the government to cut a deal to get a bigger share in the spoils of politics than his potential.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A Pakistani court on October 27 rejected petitions by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan seeking bail and cancellation of the first FIR in the cipher case for allegedly leaking state secrets and violating the laws of the country.
| Photo Credit: AP

A Pakistani court on October 27 rejected petitions by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan seeking bail and cancellation of the first FIR in the cipher case for allegedly leaking state secrets and violating the laws of the country.

Mr. Khan, 71, was arrested in August after a case was filed against him for disclosing a secret diplomatic cable (cipher) sent by the country’s embassy in Washington in March last year. A special court in Pakistan on October 23 indicted him along with his close ally ex-Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi in the case.

Mr. Khan, the chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, had approached the Islamabad High Court (IHC) with the pleas for bail in the case as well as against the FIR which was registered by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in August.

IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq after the conclusion of the hearing had reserved judgment on October 16 which he announced on Friday.

The case is about a document sent by Pakistan’s embassy in Washington in March 2022 that Mr. Khan tried to use for political purposes by saying that it was proof of a foreign conspiracy to orchestrate his ouster from power in April last year.

Mr. Khan, who served as Prime Minister of Pakistan from August 2018 to April 2022, is accused of “misuse the contents of the cipher” to build a narrative that his government was ousted due to a foreign conspiracy hatched by the U.S., a charge denied by Washington.

Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi have pleaded not guilty to the charges.

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on September 30 presented the charge sheet against Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi who signed its copies.

On October 26, the Islamabad High Court rejected Mr. Khan’s petition challenging his indictment in the case.

The court was earlier set to indict Mr. Khan on October 17, but it delayed it after Mr. Khan’s lawyers objected that he was not provided with the copies of the chargesheet.

The cipher reportedly went missing from Mr. Khan’s possession. Mr. Khan had repeatedly said before and after the no-confidence motion against him last year that the cipher pointed to a conspiracy to remove him from the Prime Minister’s office.

Mr. Khan was ousted through a vote of no-confidence in April 2022. He was incarcerated on August 5 this year, after an Islamabad court sentenced him to three years in prison in the Toshakhana case. The PTI chief was lodged in the Attock District Jail to serve his prison term.

Later, his sentence was suspended by the Islamabad High Court, but then he was arrested in the cipher case and remained in the Attock jail on judicial remand. He was later shifted to Adiala jail.

More than 150 cases have been registered against Mr. Khan since his ouster from power in April last year.

Imran Khan. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

A special court in Pakistan, on October 17, adjourned till October 23 the indictment of former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his close aide Shah Mahmood Qureshi in the cipher case for allegedly violating the secret laws of the country.

The case pertains to a secret diplomatic document that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan used to criticise his opponents for allegedly orchestrating his ouster from power in April last year.

The document reportedly went missing from his possession. Imran Khan’s party alleges that the document contained a threat from the U.S. to oust Mr. Khan from office.

The special court set up by the government held the in-camera hearing at Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail after the Islamabad High Court on October 16 rejected a plea by Mr. Khan against holding his trial in jail.

Judge Abual Hasanat Zulqernain adjourned hearing till October 23 with the remarks that Mr. Khan and former Foreign Minister Qureshi would be indicted on that day.

Barrister Salman Safdar and Khalid Yousuf Chaudhry were present as 71-year-old Khan’s counsels, the Dawn newspaper reported. “Mr. Qureshi’s wife and daughter also reached the court. However, it was not confirmed whether they were allowed to attend the hearing,” it said.

Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) special prosecutor Shah Khawar, Mr. Khan, Mr. Qureshi and their legal teams were all present during the hearing. Mr. Khawar told journalists that the indictment proceedings will take place next Monday (October 23), Geo News reported.

“On October 23, the charges will be framed and the indictment will be filed. After the indictment, the regular trial of the cipher case will begin,” he said. As per the court’s orders of October 9, both PTI leaders were expected to be indicted in the case on Tuesday.

However, the indictment could not take place on Tuesday with the court only distributing the copies of the challan (charge sheet) among the suspects. Speaking to the media after the hearing, lawyer Sher Afzal Marwat said that Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi will now be indicted during the next hearing.

Imran Khan was ousted through a vote of no-confidence in April 2022. He was incarcerated on August 5 this year, after an Islamabad court sentenced him to three years in prison in the Toshakhana case. The PTI chief was lodged in the Attock District Jail to serve his prison term.

Later, his sentence was suspended by the Islamabad High Court, but then he was arrested in the cipher case.

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Pakistan’s jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan and several top leaders of his party were directly involved in orchestrating the unprecedented anti-government violence on May 9, a joint investigation team has informed an anti-terrorism court in Lahore.

A Joint Investigation Team (JIT) was constituted to probe the violence in Punjab province following the arrest of Mr. Khan, the chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party in connection with a corruption case on May 9.

The JIT headed by DIG Operations Imran Kishwar on Thursday submitted chargesheets against PTI leaders and hundreds of workers before an anti-terrorism court, reported the Dawn newspaper on Friday.

According to Lahore police, Khan, 70, and over 900 other party leaders and activists named in the May 9 cases have been “declared guilty of serious offences”, the report said.

In the chargesheets filed before the court, the prosecution alleged that the violent protests led by the suspects on May 9 were part of a planned conspiracy against the state.

It said over “400 pieces of video evidence, including speeches of the PTI chairman, proved that the attacks on military installations and premises in cantonment areas were pre-planned”.

A large number of PTI activists had attacked military installations, police vehicles, and other public and private properties in Lahore, according to the cases registered with the police. The vandalism at the Lahore Corps Commander’s House (Jinnah House), Askari Tower, and the Shadman police station were some of the major incidents during the violence.

“We have declared them prime accused in 12 out of the total 14 cases registered under the anti-terrorism act and other charges at Lahore’s various police stations… [and] challans have been submitted in the ATC,” the Dawn newspaper quoted DIG Kishwar as saying.

He said the JIT obtained “sufficient evidence” against the nominated persons, including Imran Khan, former Punjab governor Omar Sarfaraz Cheema, former provincial ministers Mian Mehmoodur Rashid, Dr Yasmin Rashid, and others.

The digital and photogrammetric evidence as well as voice messages of the suspects “confirmed the allegations” levelled against them in over a dozen cases lodged at different police stations in the provincial capital, the DIG said.

According to the JIT report, Khan along with the cooperation of central, provincial and local leaderships, constituted this plan to push Pakistan towards civil war and the public was incited through fake and self-created stories, reported The Express Tribune.

Following the arrest of Imran Khan by paramilitary Rangers on May 9, unrest broke out in Pakistan that saw the torching and vandalising of dozens of military and state buildings, including the Army headquarters in Rawalpindi and the ISI building in Faisalabad.

Police arrested over 10,000 workers of PTI and over 100 are being tried under the Army Act.

Mr. Khan has denied masterminding or inciting the attacks stating that it was a well-planned conspiracy to oust its party from upcoming elections.

He served as the country’s prime minister until April last year and currently faces around 180 cases, most of which stem from incidents on May 9.

Mr. Khan, who has been detained since August 5 after his arrest following his conviction in the Toshakhana case, is currently serving his sentence in the cipher case in Adiala jail.

The Islamabad High Court suspended his sentence in the Toshakhana case on August 29.