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ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani high court on Wednesday granted bail to former prime minister Imran Khan in a land corruption case, his party confirmed in a statement, rejecting the “fabricated and politically motivated” cases against the cricketer-turned-politician.
Government officials allege Khan, 71, and his wife received land worth millions of dollars as a bribe from a real estate tycoon Malik Riaz Hussain through the Al-Qadir Trust, a non-governmental welfare organization set up by Bushra Watto, Khan’s third wife, and Khan in 2018 when he was still in office.
The trust runs a university outside Islamabad devoted to spirituality and Islamic teachings, a project inspired by the former first lady, who is also commonly known as Bushra Bibi and has a reputation as a spiritual healer.
Khan was briefly arrested on May 9 in connection with the case, with riots breaking out throughout the country that saw military and government installations attacked. Khan was released shortly but was arrested in August in a separate case related to the sale of state gifts illegally.
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB), Pakistan’s corruption watchdog, filed a reference against Khan in December 2023 saying he and his wife committed the offense in the land corruption case. In February this year, the former prime minister and his wife were indicted by an accountability court.
Khan, who denied the charges, appealed against the indictment at the Islamabad High Court. A two-member bench of the IHC comprising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri had reserved the verdict on Tuesday after both sides concluded their arguments.
“Islamabad High Court has accepted bail petition from the Former Prime Minister Imran Khan & has ordered his release,” Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party said in a statement.
The PTI said it had contended that the land of the trust was not for personal gain. It said the former prime minister had established a religious and scientific educational institution with the intention of providing quality education to people regardless of caste, creed, race, religion, or financial status.
It said that since the trust deed mentioned Khan and his wife could not derive any benefit from it, the “false, fabricated and politically motivated cases were filed against them only to damage their reputation.”
“And to keep him in prison, impeding his participation in general elections,” it added.
Despite the order, Khan, who has been in jail since August 2023, will not be immediately released as he is serving sentences in two other cases, one in which he and his wife are charged with violating the country’s marriage law when they wed in 2018 and in another where he is accused of leaking state secrets for political gain.
