Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has told his lawyers to get him out of Attock prison as its cells were full of flies and insects. Khan has been kept in high-security Attock prison after being convicted in the Toshakhana corruption case. Khan’s lawyers said that the former prime minister does not want to remain in a cell that is infested with flies during the day and insects at night.
Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party on Monday petitioned the Islamabad High Court to shift the former prime minister from the Attock jail in Punjab to Rawalpindi’s high-security Adiala prison. The petition also requested the High Court to transfer him to a prison where A-class facilities are available.
According to reports, Khan told his lawyer during a meeting at a jail to “take him out”. “I don’t want to remain in jail, take me out of here,” the prison officials quoted Khan as saying. Khan’s counsel Naeem Haider Panjotha, who met Khan in jail, said he was being kept in “distressing” and provided “C-Class jail facilities”.
On Tuesday, Khan’s lawyer said that he has been kept in a small bug-infested cell with an open washroom in the Attock jail. Panjotha said the jail cell where the former prime minister was being held was infested with flies and bugs. He is in a small room “which has an open washroom”, the lawyer said after meeting Khan in prison on Monday. “The PTI chairman says he is ready to spend his whole life in jail,” the lawyer was quoted as saying by Geo News.
Panjotha told the media that Imran Khan informed him that he has been kept in a dark room with an open toilet, frequented by flies during the day and ants at night. “I have been kept in a dark room with no television or newspaper available. Nobody is allowed to meet me as if I am a terrorist,” the lawyer said.
Meanwhile, the Islamabad HC has asked the authorities to apprise it who ordered to keep Khan at Attock jail instead of Adiala as directed by the sessions court. The court also instructed the assistant advocate general to find out about the authority responsible for determining prisoner transfers and submit a report by August 11 during the hearing of Khan’s plea seeking transfer from one prison to another
The PTI chief was arrested on Saturday shortly after an Islamabad trial court found him guilty of “corrupt practices” in the Toshakhana case. He later challenged the conviction in the High Court, saying the verdict by a “biased” judge was a “slap in the face of due process and fair trial” and “a gross travesty of justice”.
The Islamabad HC on Wednesday heard the matter but did not pass any order. The court, however, assured Khan that his case would be decided in four to five days.Â
Imran Khan is accused of buying and selling gifts in state possession that were received during visits abroad and worth more than Rs 14 crores.Â
