Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: In a sigh of relief for the ousted prime minister, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Mon-day restored visiting days for incarcerated Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan, allow-ing people to meet him every Tuesday and Thursday.
Only those individuals whose names are provided by the PTI founder’s coordinator Salman Akram Raja will be permitted to meet him.
The latest development in the legal saga pertaining to the former prime minister’s visitation rights as IHC Acting Chief Justice Justice Sarfraz Dogar heard the combined pleas on the said issue.
The three-member bench, which also includes Justice Arbab Muhammad Tahir and Justice Muham-mad Azam Khan, was formed by Justice Dogar last week who also merged various petitions about Khan’s meeting rights in response to a plea filed by jail Superintendent Abdul Ghafoor Anjum.
Before today, the Adiala jail Superintendent Anjum, using his discretionary powers, had limited the former premier’s meetings to Tuesdays. The issue of access to the incarcerated PTI founder has been a point of contention in recent times with various people moving the court to seek its permission to meet him.
The IHC, in this regard, had previously sought Khan’s virtual appearance via video link and later ordered authorities to produce him before the court during a hearing of a plea filed by PTI’s Mashal Yousafzai.
However, the cricketer-turned-politician was not produced before the court with the Islamabad advo-cate general (AG) citing security concerns as its reason.
The issue further escalated after IHC’s Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq Khan initiated suo motu contempt pro-ceedings after the case was delisted and transferred to another bench.
During the hearing today, the jail superintendent’s lawyer Naveed Malik informed the court that pris-on meetings had been conducted under the same standard operating procedures (SOPs) until De-cember 2024 but Khan’s status as a prisoner changed in January 2025 and this was accompanied by se-curity threats as well. As per the jail manual, meetings with the PTI founder were being arranged on Tuesdays, he added.
The lawyer further said that after January, the ex-prime minister’s status changed from an under-trial prisoner to a convicted prisoner.
IHC’s acting CJ Justice Dogar remarked that everyone submits requests for holding meetings inside the jail.
At this, the jail superintendent’s lawyer said that these meetings were being used for political purpos-es.
The judge then questioned the need for media talks after prison meetings, saying that the visitors should leave after their meeting.
“We should obtain an undertaking from visitors to ensure they do not hold media talks after the meet-ings,” the judge remarked.
Meanwhile, Justice Tahir said that the SOPs for meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays had been decid-ed in the appeal. The jail superintendent’s lawyer said that both meetings were scheduled on Tues-days instead of holding meetings on two separate days due to security threats.
Advocate Malik said that, according to jail rules, the superintendent of Adiala prison holds the authori-ty. He added that in such circumstances, it is the superintendent’s responsibility to decide on the meetings as per the rules.
During the hearing, PTI leader Raja requested the court to restore the schedule of two weekly meet-ings.
However, the jail superintendent’s advocate argued that managing meetings on two separate days was difficult, so all meetings were being arranged on a single day.
IHC’s acting CJ noted that more than 100 petitions regarding prison meetings had been filed, and near-ly 98 had been resolved. He further said that they want the matter to be settled once and for all by a larger bench.
