Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) has canceled the interim bail of former Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Asad Umar on the grounds of skipping the case hearing. Asad Umar did not appear before the court on interim bail. Lahore's Shadman police station has registered a case of arson. Senior Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Asad Umar has announced his decision to quit politics, as well as his party completely. The former minister announced his decision in a post on X, formerly Twitter. In the post, Asad Umar says he had decided to completely quit politics after more than a decade in public life. "As I had already stated publicly earlier that I disagree with the policy of confrontation with state institutions, and such a policy has led to a serious collision with state institutions, which is not in the interest of the country," he said in the post. Asad also wrote that he was resigning from his basic membership of the PTI. After more than one decade in public life, I have decided to completely quit politics. In a post on X he said: ""I want to thank all those who have supported me in public life. In particular, I want to thank the NA-54 team and the voters who elected me twice. I have tried my best to serve the constituency that i was elected from.

May Allah's blessings shine upon the Pakistani nation." Earlier in May this year, Asad Umar announced his decision to step down from his position as the secretary general of the PTI, following a crackdown on the party after violent protests broke out on May 9 in the wake of party chief Imran Khan’s arrest. However, at that time, the former minister had neither quit the party nor politics. Addressing a press conference on May 25, Umar claimed he was not stepping down from the party office “under pressure”. He had said that the past 13 months were “the most difficult time” for the PTI and cited the arrests of thousands of party workers. He said he had been in jail for 15 days, adding that everyone had condemned the May 9 riots as shocking. “A transparent inquiry should be conducted as thousands of people are under arrest. Those who were involved should be punished,” he maintained. The former PTI leader had also claimed that he had no pressure to quit the party, which was why he had decided to resign from the party positions.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)