ISLAMABAD: An accountability court has approved an eight-day physical remand for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder and former Prime Minister Imran Khan, along with his spouse Bushra Bibi, in a new Toshakhana reference.
The development comes just a day after the couple received much-needed relief when a court acquitted them in the iddat case — also known as the un-Islamic nikah case — but it was short-lived as the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) arrested the couple in a new Toshakhana reference.
Additional Sessions Judge Muhammad Afzal Majoka had a day earlier nixed the couple’s conviction — in which they were sentenced to seven years in prison and awarded a fine of Rs500,000 each — after a trial court found their nikah to be fraudulent when Khawar Maneka, Bushra’s ex-husband, moved the court against the couple’s marriage.
However, soon after the verdict overturning their conviction, a team of the anti-corruption watchdog, headed by Deputy Director Mohsin Haroon, arrested the couple in Adiala Jail in the new reference related to the alleged “misuse of power for acquiring Toshakhana gifts.”
The PTI, after securing a key legal victory when a 13-member Supreme Court bench declared the party eligible for the allocation of reserved seats, was looking forward to their founder’s release — which, if it had happened, would have given a major boost to the former ruling party.
The accountability court today directed the anti-graft watchdog to interrogate the two suspects in Adiala Jail and ordered the couple to be produced before the court on July 22.
Imran Khan’s lawyer, Zaheer Abbas Chaudhary, while speaking to media persons, said that NAB had requested a 14-day physical remand of the PTI founder and Bushra Bibi.
The Lawyer said that they opposed the physical remand, pleading that they have engagements in the £190 million reference.
Chaudhary said that the ex-premier and his wife’s arrest was against the law, adding that their petition seeking bail was already being heard in the Supreme Court.
