A district and sessions court in Islamabad on Thursday accepted the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) plea seeking criminal proceedings against PTI chief and former prime minister Imran Khan in the Toshakhana case.
The court has fixed the case for hearing and summoned the former premier in in personal capacity on January 9, reported Express News.
Additional Sessions Judge Zafar Iqbal announced the verdict, which was reserved last Monday. The court issued notice to the former prime minister on the ECP’s petition saying prima facie the former PM had failed to submit correct information in his declaration of assets.
In November, the trial court had taken up the Toshakhana reference filed by the ECP seeking action under criminal law against Imran for allegedly indulging in corrupt practices, which the former prime minister denies.
Also read: Court reserves verdict on ECP plea against Imran
The electoral watchdog claimed that Imran allegedly misled officials about the gifts he received from foreign dignitaries during his tenure as the prime minister. It claimed that the PTI chief had “deliberately concealed his assets relating to Toshakhana gifts retained by him particularly in year 2018 and 2019 […] in the statements of assets and liabilities filed for the year 2017-2018 and 2018-19”.
On October 22, the ECP disqualified Imran from his parliamentary membership for filing “false” and “incorrect declaration” in his statement of assets and liabilities for the year 2020-21 filed with the electoral entity.
In the written judgment, the ECP said: “As per the statement of Imran Khan he had purchased the gifts from Toshakhana paying 21.564 million rupees while the Cabinet Division said that the gifts had a value of 107.943 million.”
“The amount in his bank account was around half of the value of the state gifts. Imran Khan was bound to declare the cash and bank details in his returns but he didn’t declare it,” ECP decision read.