Islamabad:
Former Prime Minister Imran Khan has challenged an order from the Superior Court of Lahore (LHC) that rejected his bail supplications, arguing that the prosecution has adopted three different positions to link it with the alleged conspiracy of May 9, 2023 disturbance incidents, all of which were rejected by different courts.
The founder of PTI through his lawyer Salman Safdar presented a request against the LHC order in the Supreme Court. A division bank of the Superior Court led by Judge Shahbaz Ali Rizvi on June 24 said that Imran was supposedly involved in the conspiracy of disturbances in view of the testimonies of two police officers.
When commenting on the order, the petition said that the Prosecutor’s Office repeatedly could not establish any credible link between Imran Khan and the alleged occurrence narrated in the FIR.
According to the petition, the Prosecutor’s Office in its attempts to link the petitioner with the alleged acts of conspiracy and support resorted to three conflicting versions, each of which differs in terms of the alleged date, time, location and incitement witnesses.
He said that the three versions have been judicially incredulous by the Anti -Terrorist Courts (ATC) or by the LHC. He pointed out that during the procedures for the bail prior to the arrest before the ATC-III in Lahore, the Prosecutor’s Office lately affirmed that a police officer, Hassam Afzal, allegedly listened to a conspiracy in Zaman Park.
He said that this event occurred two days before May 9, on May 7. The Prosecutor’s Office also stated that another Astat Kamal inspector heard the embedding in Chakri’s rest area five days before the occurrence, as of May 4, 2023.
“However, this version was discredited due to the lack of prosecution to justify the late dissemination of such critical information and, consequently, was rejected by the wise special judge ATC-III in Lahore, who confirmed the bonds prior to the arrest of the petitioner on March 1, 2024 in FIR No 366/23 and 1078/23”.
The petition said that after the collapse of its first narrative, the Prosecutor’s Office advanced a second version during the criminal review hearing before the LHC, arguing that Imran Khan allegedly prompted the acts through media statements.
However, the Prosecutor’s Office could not produce any objectable or incriminatory material to corroborate this statement, which led to the LHC to reject this version as well.
Subsequently, the State sought to trust the statements of three new witnesses, including the leaders of PTI Sadaqat Abbasi and Wasiq Qayyum, as new evidence to support its third version of the conspiracy.
“This final attempt was also found with desire and was expressly incredulous by the ATC-I, Rawalpindi, which unloaded the coacusada Bushra Imran through a well reasoned order dated 20.08.2024.
“The continuous breach of the Prosecutor’s Office to present coherent, consistent and credible evidence after multiple opportunities clearly brings the case within the scope of an additional investigation, which makes the petitioner be entitled to the granting of the bail after arrest under section 497 (2) CRPC 1898,” he said.
The petition stated that despite the rejection of the three fiscal versions by several competent forums, the LHC on June 24 declined Imran’s bond while trusting only in the statements of the two police officers: Inspector Asmat Kamal and thus Hassam AFZAL.
“However, these same statements had already been judicially incredulous in previous procedures where the bonds prior to the arrest were granted to the petitioner,” he said.
He said that the trust imposed by the LHC in previously discarded and delayed police statements amounted to a clear inconsistency in the judicial appreciation of evidence.
“These contradictory views of the courts below, especially in a case in which the only accusation is of embedding and conspiracy, reinforce even more than the matter guarantees a deeper scrutiny and falls directly within the parameters of additional investigation,” he said.
According to the request, in the order, LHC tried to justify the delay in the statements of the witnesses relying on an explanation provided by the prosecutor, who said that the information about the reduction quickly communicated and took the police records on May 4, 2023.
“Surprisingly, this explanation had never been offered before any judicial forum or during the procedures of the bonds prior or subsequent to the arrest before the wise ATCs, nor during the Remunction hearings, not even before the LHC during the Remunction Hearing or the Supreme Court in previous stages.
“This new explanation appears for the first time in the contested order, without any probative basis or prosecuting statement to support it.
“The agency deposited in such a retrospective and without the foundation of the prosecutor constitutes a manifest error by the Bank of the Division learned,” he added.
He said that the LHC is inadvertently filling the lagoons left by the Prosecutor’s Office, a task clearly out of the reach of judicial discretion in affairs of bail and undermines the equity of reasoning applied in the contested order.
The petition declared that Imran Khan has been maliciously involved in the instantaneous case as part of a politically calculated and motivated design to prolong his imprisonment and subject him to harassment, and tarnish his public image.
He said the circumstances show that the arrest of the petitioner was never genuinely required in cases related to May 9. This was evident for the conspicuous inaction of the Police for a prolonged period of fourteen months to involve and stop the petitioner in this case.
The petition said the police knew the whereabouts of the petitioners, the prison of adults, but did not make any significant attempt to make their arrest. “This lack of urgency or interest on the part of the investigating agency firmly supports the inference that the arrest was not necessary due to the merits of the case, but rather a tool of oppression, thus justifying the granting of the subsequent bond to the arrest”
The petition said that Imran Khan was entitled to the granting of the bond after arrest in the principle of well established consistency, as stated through various judgments of the Apex court.
“A critical and directly relevant bond order approved in favor of a coacusado, Mr. Ejaz Chaudhary, for [the SC] on May 2, 2025, during the processing of the present bail matter before [LHC]It seems to have escaped the attention of the Bank of the Division learned.
“This order was issued by a three -members bank headed by Judge Naeem Akhtar Afghan, in which the subsequent bond was granted to Mr. Ejaz Chaudhary despite the accusations of conspiracy on the events of May 9.
“In paragraph 5 of said judgment, this [SC] He expressed concern about the failure of the Prosecutor’s Office to justify the delay in the registration of the plaintiff’s complementary declaration
“In addition, in paragraph 6, it was argued that in an attempt evaluation of the registration, the case against the coacusado fell within the scope of an additional investigation under section 497 (2) CRPC 1898”.
The petition stressed that the ATC-III in Lahore confirmed the bail prior to the arrest of Imran in two cases of May 9 through a detailed order on March 1, 2024, followed by the bail concession after arrest in four additional cases on November 8, 204.
“These orders, based on similar accusations and the same fiscal evidence, have not been annulled by any superior court and have reached the purpose.”
He said that Imran Khan has already been granted bail in 21 criminal cases that arise from the incidents of May 9, all of which were based on substantially identical evidence.
“These consistent judicial findings firmly support their right to bail after arrest by parity and additional investigation, particularly in the case of a case manufactured at the request of political adversaries.
“In addition, both [the LHC] and the [ATCs] In Lahore and Rawalpindi, in multiple procedures, they have registered observations that seriously show the credibility of the prosecution’s narrative, “he said.
