ISLAMABAD – Ousted premier and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief on Monday approached Islamabad High Court, seeking protective bail to avoid arrest in the prohibited funding case.
The defiant politician moved court a day after federal investigators booked him along with the party’s financial team and a manager of a private bank in a prohibited funding case.
In the petitions filed through his counsel, the former prime minister expressed apprehensions about his arrest at the hands of the apex investigation agency. He prayed before the court to grant bail so he can appear in the concerned court.
On Tuesday, FIA Commercial Banking Circle lodged a case, months after the electoral watchdog maintained that the Imran Khan-led party failed to disclose accounts and that hiding accounts is a violation of Article 17 of the Constitution.
The FIR said the Abraaj Group, which is owned by business tycoon Arif Naqvi, allegedly transferred $2.1 million to the PTI account in the branch of a bank situated at Jinnah Avenue in the federal capital.
The FIA booked Sardar Azhar Tariq, Tariq Shafi, and Younis Aamir Kiani in the same case. It also stated that Arif Naqvi submitted a fake affidavit to the ECP in prohibited funding case.
Some officials of the bank branch have also been named in the FIR over failing to report the authorities concerned about suspicious transactions related to PTI.
ECP maintained that the party had submitted a fake affidavit about its bank accounts, and it had determined that the party hid 13 bank accounts that it should have declared.