ISLAMABAD: While the hearing of bail pleas of former prime minister Imran Khan and his spouse Bushra Bibi in the £190 million case was cancelled after a judge went on leave, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan expressed hope of his early release.

The case was dropped from the cause list after Justice Mohammad Asif, a member of Islamabad High Court division bench, headed by acting Chief Justice Sardar Mohammad Sarfaraz Dogar, proceeded on leave.

Senior PTI leaders, including party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan, Leader of the Opposition in the Natio­nal Assembly Omar Ayub Khan, KP Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur, and Imran Khan’s sister Aleema Khan, arrived at the IHC and met officials in the chief justice’s secretariat to press for rescheduling the hearing.

After a two-and-a-half-hour wait, the court fixed June 26 as the new date for hearing the pleas, seeking suspension of sentence.

Security at the IHC was visibly heightened, with additional personnel dep­lo­yed and barbed wires ins­t­alled around entrances amid PTI leaders’ presence and media activity.

Speaking to the media outside the court, the party chairman expressed disappointment over the delay but remained optimistic about Mr Khan’s early release.

“The judge was on leave, so the case could not be heard today. But the day is not far when the PTI founder would walk free,” he said.

He criticised the backlog of cases, stating that proceedings of cases such as the present one should be concluded within a month.

He also voiced concern over the deteriorating state of justice, pointing out that the country now ranks 129th in the Rule of Law Index, down from 97th in 1996.

Published in Dawn, June 12th, 2025