PTI founder chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan has challenged his convictions in cipher, Toshakhana and Iddat cases in Islamabad High Court (IHC) and sessions court on Friday. Appeals against conviction in cipher and Toshakhana cases was filed in the IHC and against conviction in Iddat case was submitted in the sessions court. PTI senior counsel Sardar Latif Khosa confirmed to journalists outside the IHC that the appeals against convictions have been filed. Earlier, there were reports that another PTI counsel Salman Safdar had drafted appeals against the convictions awarded in the cipher, Toshakhana and Iddat cases before 2024 general elections. On January 30, Imran Khan and his close aide, former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi, had been sentenced to 10 years in jail in cipher case related to the leaking of state secrets. The special court set up at a prison in Rawalpindi had announced the sentence in the cipher case, which pertained to a diplomatic cable that Imran Khan claimed proved his allegation that his removal from power in 2022 was a US conspiracy. On January 31, an anti-graft court had jailed Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Khan for 14 years each on charges of illegally selling state gifts.

The sentence in the Toshakhana case also included a 10-year disqualification from holding public office. Bushra Khan, commonly known as Bushra Bibi, had, however, been allowed by authorities to serve her sentence at Imran Khan's Islamabad hilltop mansion at Banigala. Later, Bushra Bibi had moved the court to allow her to undergo her sentence in prison and not at Banigala residence, which the authorities turned into a sub-jail. The third conviction in merely one week came in Iddat case. On February 3, a court in Islamabad had sentenced the PTI leader and his spouse Bushra Bibi to seven years in jail, along with a Rs0.5 million fine each, for “contracting marriage during the ‘Iddat’ (period of waiting)” of the former first lady. The judge set aside the ‘nikah’ of Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi solemnised on January 1, 2018, as he announced the sentence under Section 496 of the Pakistan Penal Code. According to the court, the ‘nikah’ was solemnised during the “mandatory Iddat period” of Bushra Bibi.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)