Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman, Imran Khan’s appeal against the Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) ruling has been adjourned in the Supreme Court on Thursday.
The adjournment will continue until the Islamabad High Court issued a verdict on the petition that requests the suspension of the sentence in the Toshakhana case.
A three-member bench, led by Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial, presided over the case concurrently with the IHC’s consideration of the former Prime Minister’s appeal against the Toshakhana verdict.
At the outset of proceeding in Supreme Court today, Chief Justice Bandial praised IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq’s efforts and deemed it better if the high court’s issued its verdict.
Chief Justice Bandial inquired about the presence of representatives from the attorney general’s office in the courtroom to provide information about Imran Khan’s conditions while incarcerated after being ousted from the Prime Minister’s office in April of the previous year via a vote of no-confidence.
Additionally, he instructed authorities to furnish a report on the facilities provided to Khan while in jail.
Khan’s lawyer, Sardar Latif Khosa, informed the court that their arguments had been presented before the IHC.
Chief Justice Bandial noted that the objections previously raised by Khan’s legal team had been heard.
Furthermore, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail inquired about the outcome of the IHC’s hearing, to which Khosa responded that he, being a non-politician, could not offer extensive commentary.
Chief Justice Bandial remarked at one point that, “This is the beauty of the system that first a decision is made at the high court and then it comes to the Supreme Court.”
In a prior session, the Supreme Court, addressing a petition challenging IHC’s decision to return the case to the trial court judge who had issued the conviction, acknowledged procedural defects in Khan’s conviction. However, the Supreme Court opted to await the IHC’s ruling on the former premier’s plea for the suspension of his three-year sentence.
A two-member IHC bench comprising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Tariq Memhmood Jahangiri conducted the hearing on the PTI chief’s plea against the Toshakhana verdict on Thursday.
The former Prime Minister, presently incarcerated in Attock jail, was found guilty of corrupt practices in a case involving the misdeclaration of state gifts.
The PTI filed an appeal in the IHC challenging the trial court’s verdict and sentence against Imran Khan, requesting the court to declare the judgment “illegal.”
The Toshakhana was a place for storing state gifts and the 70-year-old politician was accused of misusing his 2018 to 2022 premiership to buy and sell state-owned gifts worth more than Rs140 million ($635,000).
The gifts included wristwatches reportedly sold by Khan’s aides in Dubai. Among them were seven wristwatches, six of which were Rolex, with the most valuable being a “Master Graff limited edition” valued at 85 million Pakistani rupees ($385,000).
A reference was sent to the Election Commission, and in October 2022, the electoral body found Khan guilty of corrupt practices and filed a complaint in an Islamabad court.
