Pakistan’s jailed former PM Imran Khan’s lawyer Khalid Yousaf Chaudhry (right), arrives to submit appeals against their convictions for graft, at the High Court in Islamabad on January 27, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Pakistan’s jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his wife, Bushra Bibi, on Monday (January 27, 2025) challenged in a High Court their conviction in the Al-Qadir Trust case.

An accountability court in Islamabad convicted the former first couple in the high-profile £190 million case in a much-anticipated ruling earlier this month.

As already indicated by the party, their lawyers filed an appeal in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) against the conviction and sentence, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf said in a WhatsApp message.

“Legal Team representing Imran Khan & Bushra BiBi, challenges Al-Qadir Trust case decision at IHC,” the party said, adding that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) “maliciously misused its authority by announcing sentence, with incomplete investigation”.

It further stated that the decision to approach the high court was taken to annul the decision and order acquittal of the former first couple.

Judge Nasir Javed Rana of anti-corruption court announced the reserved verdict on January 17, convicting Khan and his wife Bibi guilty of corruption in the case and sentencing them to 14 and seven years respectively in prison.

The NAB, the top anti-corruption body, in December 2023 had filed the case against Khan, Bibi and six others, accusing them of causing loss to the tune of Rs 50 billion to the national kitty.

However, only the former first couple has been prosecuted as all others, including a property tycoon, were out of the country.

Also Read | Imran Khan moves Lahore HC for post-arrest bail in eight cases linked to May 9 riot

The case was based on the charge that an amount of £190 million pound, returned to Pakistan by the U.K.’s National Crime Agency as part of a settlement with a property tycoon was misused.

The funds were reportedly intended for the national treasury but were allegedly redirected for personal benefit of the businessman who helped Bibi and Khan to set up a university.

Bibi, as a trustee of the Al-Qadir Trust, was accused of benefiting from this settlement, including acquiring 458 kanals of land for Al-Qadir University in Jhelum.

Islamabad:

A Pakistan court has accepted requests for a medical examination of the incarcerated former prime minister Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi and also directed an endoscopy for the former first lady at a private hospital within two days.

Mr Khan, 71, has been lodged at Adiala Jail at Rawalpindi after conviction in multiple cases while Bushra Bibi is currently jailed at Bani Gala — Khan’s home in Islamabad – which was turned into a sub-jail since the couple was sentenced in the ‘un-Islamic nikah’ case in February.

During the hearing of the 190 million-pound NCA case at the Adiala Jail at the accountability court on Friday, Khan, the founder of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, claimed that Bushra Bibi, 49, was given food mixed with toilet cleaner, The News International reported on Saturday.

Mr Khan said Shaukat Khanum Hospital Chief Medical Officer Dr Asim Yousaf had recommended Bushra Bibi’s tests at the Shifa International Hospital but the jail administration was adamant on conducting the test at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) here.

The court adjourned the hearing until April 23.

Earlier, Mr Khan told Judge Nasir Javed Rana that additional walls had been erected in the courtroom, creating an atmosphere reminiscent of a closed court.

The judge directed the jail administration to remove the additional barriers immediately and adjourned the hearing for an hour. The jail administration obeyed the order and removed the additional barriers within no time.

On April 16, Islamabad High Court disposed of a petition filed by Bushra Bibi seeking her transfer to the Adiala jail as her lawyers failed to turn up before the court.

A day later, Mr Khan alleged that Army chief General Asim Munir was directly responsible for the imprisonment of his wife Bushra Bibi. “If anything happens to my wife, I will not leave Asim Munir, I will not leave Asim Munir as long as I am alive. I will expose his unconstitutional and illegal steps,” the PTI leader had threatened during a conversation with journalists at the Adiala Jail on April 18. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)