By Staff Reporter
RAWALPINDI: The opposition party of imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan accused the police on Tuesday night of violently detaining three of his sisters and several senior party figures outside the gates of Adiala Jail, where the women had waited for more than twelve hours in hope of a court-ordered family meeting that never took place.
In a series of furious statements and videos posted to social media, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf said Aleema Khan, Noreen Niazi and Dr. Uzma Khan had been sitting peacefully with party workers when police moved in shortly after 10 pm. The party said police first flooded the area with water, then switched off the lights, and finally, in the darkness and confusion, physically assaulted the women and dragged at least one of them across the road before bundling them into vehicles.
“Those women were dragging [her] on the road,” Aleema Khan could be heard saying in one video as she comforted a visibly trembling Noreen Niazi, who appeared close to tears. The party also said Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Local Government Minister Meena Khan Afridi, Member of the National Assembly Shahid Khattak, and several female party workers were beaten and detained in the same operation.
“What should be routine weekly court-mandated family visits, in accordance with Imran Khan’s rights as a prisoner, are being used as a tool of oppression and violence against his family members and supporters,” PTI said in a statement posted to X. A second post called the treatment “inhumane, unlawful, and disgraceful,” and accused the Punjab provincial government of ordering “an appalling operation that no civilised or democratic society could ever justify.”
The party said Khan’s sisters and his legal team had arrived at the jail on Tuesday morning but were refused entry and told to wait outside. By nightfall, after twelve hours in the cold without food or shelter, the police action began. “The area where Imran’s sisters were seated was intentionally flooded with water,” PTI wrote. “The lights were switched off to plunge the entire place into darkness, and in the ensuing chaos, police physically assaulted Imran Khan’s sisters Aleema Khan, Noreen Khan and Uzma Khan.”
It added that one sister was “dragged across the road, manhandled, and violently detained despite her cries and the pleas of those present.” “This level of state oppression and cruelty represents an unprecedented assault on basic human dignity, constitutional freedoms, and moral norms,” the party said.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi condemned the treatment of Khan’s sisters and the attempted arrest of members of his provincial cabinet and legislature. “The attempt to arrest MNA Shahid Khattak and other provincial and national assembly members is also condemnable,” he said, warning that the country was moving toward “a point of no return.” Prominent lawyer and activist Jibran Nasir described the incident as part of a broader campaign of humiliation directed at Khan and his supporters. “With every crime, the usurpers feel more and more immune,” Nasir wrote on X. “Abductions, arrests, raids, military court trials, rigged elections, amendments — all are connected. Every time they get away with no accountability, they feel more immune.”
Sayed Zulfikar Bukhari, a senior PTI leader living in exile, called the police conduct “highly despicable behaviour” and said the party “strongly condemn[ed] this disgraceful and unjustifiable act. ”Punjab police and provincial government spokesmen did not immediately respond to requests for comment late Tuesday. Khan, the former prime minister and cricket star who was ousted in a parliamentary no-confidence vote in 2022, has been held at Adiala Jail since August 2023 on a series of charges that include corruption, inciting violence and violating marriage laws. He and his party insist the cases are politically motivated to keep him out of politics. Family meetings, mandated weekly by court order, have repeatedly been cancelled or restricted in recent months, according to PTI officials, further fueling accusations that the authorities are trying to isolate the opposition leader
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