After nearly a year in jail, former Pakistan PM Imran Khan and wife Bushra Bibi acquitted in illegal marriage case

Islamabad, July 13

A Pakistani court on Saturday acquitted jailed former prime minister Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi in the un-Islamic marriage case, the only case keeping the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party founder behind bars since August last year.

On February 3 — days before the general elections on February 8 — an Islamabad court convicted the couple based on a complaint filed by Bushra Bibi’s ex-husband, Khawar Fareed Maneka, who alleged that they contracted marriage during the former first lady’s Iddat period.

In Islam, a woman can’t remarry before completing four months after divorce or the death of her husband.

The couple had challenged the sentence in a district and session court of the capital Islamabad where Additional District and Sessions Judge (ADSJ) Afzal Majoka heard the case.

The judge announced the judgment in the afternoon after reserving the verdict earlier in the day, acquitting Khan, 71 and Bushra, 49.

“If they are not wanted in any other case, then PTI founder Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi should be released [from jail] immediately,” the judge said after accepting their appeals.

But it was not clear if he would be released. However, it was the only case for which Khan was in jail after the Toshakhana corruption case sentence was suspended and acquittal in the cipher case.

The cricketer-turned-politician has been behind bars since August last year after he was sentenced in the Toshakhana corruption case and subsequently sentenced in other cases ahead of the February 8 elections.

Bibi’s ex-husband, Maneka, filed the case against the couple in November 2023, alleging that they married without her observing the mandatory waiting period of Iddat. He asked the court to declare the marriage null and void.

Khan and Bibi married in 2018, the year Khan went on to win elections and become prime minister.

Bibi was ostensibly his spiritual guide but the two developed affection for each other during their meetings. She got divorced from her husband of 28 years with whom she had five children.

She is the third wife of Khan, a former cricketing hero, who during his heydays of sporting career had a playboy reputation.

PTI chief Gohar Khan welcomed the verdict and said it was a victory for the independent judiciary. “All these cases were fake and he will also get justice in all other cases,” he said, demanding that Imran Khan should be freed as it was the last case in which he was convicted.

The judgment in the case comes a day after Khan’s embattled PTI party won a huge legal battle when the Supreme Court declared it eligible for the reserved seats in Parliament and in the provincial assemblies following the controversy-ridden general election on February 8.

Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Friday ruled that the party was eligible for more than 20 seats reserved for women and minorities in Parliament.