ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Monday rejected the request for an “immediate” meeting with PTI founder Imran Khan, and issued a notice to the government for tomorrow.
The SC had fixed for hearing 13 petitions related to Imran and his spouse Bushra Bibi, and said PTI’s memorandum seeking jail visitation rights for the party founder has been forwarded to the relevant executive authorities for consideration under the law.
Imran has been in jail since August 2023, convicted in a string of cases he says were politically driven following his ouster in a 2022 no-confidence vote.
The request for the meeting, submitted by senior PTI leader Latif Khosa, was rejected by a two-member bench comprising Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Yahya Afridi and Justice Shahid Bilal Hassan.
The bench observed that such an order could not be passed without hearing the other side. Hence, a notice was then issued to the government for tomorrow (Tuesday).
Addressing Khosa during the hearing, CJP Afridi said that “we have to overcome the hurdle of the maintainability of the application”. “Keep in mind that you have cases pending in other courts,” he remarked.
“We believe that the case has become infructuous,” he said, recalling an Aug 24, 2023 order “against which the case was filed”.
The court “cannot issue any order regarding the meeting without issuing notice”, CJP Afridi added.
The SC also ordered the formation of a three-member bench to hear appeals against the PTI founder’s acquittal in the cipher case.
A three-member bench has also been ordered to hear appeals against the acquittal of PTI leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi in the same case. The Islamabad High Court (IHC) had acquitted Imran and Qureshi in the cipher case on June 3, 2024.
Hearing Imran’s bail petition in the Al-Qadir University Trust case, in which the former premier was sentenced to 14 years in prison in 2025, the court dismissed the PTI founder’s bail plea as infructuous.
According to a supplementary cause list issued last week, the petitions fixed for hearing for Monday included the Punjab government’s appeal against the granting of bail to the PTI founder and his wife.
Further, Imran’s appeal against the case registered against him under the Official Secrets Act and the National Accountability Bureau case against the ex-premier in relation to the Al-Qadir University Trust was also fixed for hearing.
Imran’s appeal against a Rs10 billion defamation lawsuit filed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was also set to be heard.
‘Sign of political victimisation’
Later, speaking to the media, Imran’s lawyer, Salman Safdar, maintained that hearing 14 petitions at once was a “sign of political victimisation”.
“The chief justice today heard all the petitions against the PTI founder’s cases,” he said.
Safdar maintained that the government had filed appeals “against every case in which the former premier had received relief”.
Recalling the cipher case, he said that “it was the most high-stakes trial in Pakistan, and you saw how it ended”, the counsel added.
He held that the SC had “always granted us relief”, adding that he “appealed to meet the chief justice”.
“In the past five months, we have only had a five-minute meeting” with the former premier, he said.
“Our cases are not being fixed for hearing, and there is a ban on our meetings,” Safdar lamented.
The lawyer asserted that “more than 300 cases” had been filed against the incarcerated former premier. He added that multiple bail pleas were pending before Additional District and Sessions Judge Afzal Majoka.
Safdar recalled that “a letter was written to the chief justice of the IHC this month”, but said that “IHC is not ready to fix any case for hearing”.
He claimed that, as IHC “had no standing at all”, such a case should be “directed to the SC”.
The IHC has been “reduced to a palace for show”, Safdar said.
Shifting his attention to the former premier’s health, he said that the defence had “not yet even brought up medical ground in the court” for bail.
“This does not mean that we should be kept in the dark about PTI founder’s health,” he added.
The former premier has been incarcerated since Aug 5, 2023, currently imprisoned at Rawalpindi’s Central Jail.
A two-page memorandum filed by the PTI on Friday alleged that Imran’s rights as a prisoner and a human being have been consistently violated during this period.
The PTI memorandum also highlighted the reports about “Imran being subjected to some secretive medical procedure at a hospital in Islamabad and keeping his relatives in the dark in violation of jail rules”.
Separately, PTI leader Salman Akram Raja, speaking to the media, said that the party had “submitted a memorandum that cases were not being fixed in the IHC”.
“The cases heard today were government cases, which were unnecessary,” Raja said, adding that the cases in which the party was seeking relief “have not yet been fixed”.
“Khan Sahib is not being allowed to meet us, and neither does he have any information regarding the facts,” he added.
“This is completely unfair.”
Addressing the matter of Imran’s health, he said, “We have been given an incomplete medical report.”
“We have no hope of getting justice at this point; however, we will keep knocking on the doors of the court,” he further said.
