FIA opens inquiry against Imran Khan over ₹180 million necklace case

|HT|

The Federal Investigation Agency has opened an inquiry against former prime minister Imran Khan over allegations that he gifted a necklace to Zulfikar Bukhari who had sold it to a jeweller in Lahore for ₹180 million (PKR). The necklace in the first place was gifted to the former prime minister and was supposed to be deposited in Toshakhana, Pakistan's The Express Tribune reported. Zulfikar Bukhari was Imran Khan's special assistant. In exchange for the necklace, Imran Khan deposited a few hundred thousand rupees, not half the price of the possession, as stipulated by Pakistani laws. The laws said public gifts can be kept by state officials by paying half of the price. If they neither submit the gift nor deposit half of the price, then the act becomes an illegal one.

His party has not yet commented on the fresh allegation as it has already swung into preparation for the election. In his first public address on Wednesday in Peshawar since his ouster through the no-confidence vote in the assembly, Imran Khan questioned the judiciary why it opened its doors at midnight to facilitate the no-confidence motion which, according to him, was done at the behest of foreign powers. "I ask the judiciary that when you opened the court in the dead of night ... this nation has known me for 45 years. Have I ever broken the law? When I played cricket, did anyone ever accuse me of match-fixing?" he said. A day after his ouster, a petition was filed seeking to register a treason case against Imran Khan and other ministers of his government, which was dismissed by the court.

(Except for the headline and the pictorial description, this story has not been edited by THE DEN staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)