Islamabad (Web Desk): An Islamabad trial court on Saturday declared Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman and former premier Imran Khan guilty of “corrupt practices” in the Toshakhana case and sentenced him to three years in prison.
According to details, Rejecting Khan's petition seeking inadmissibility of the case, Judge Dilawar sentenced the former prime minister to three-year imprisonment.
Additional and Sessions Judge Humayun Dilawar announced the judgment.
The court also imposed a fine of Rs100,000 on the PTI chief.
The development comes a day after the the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Friday declared the session court's maintainability verdict in the Toshakhana case against the PTI chief "void".
In its ruling, the IHC directed the sessions court to decide the case after hearing it again.
Meanwhile, the court had also rejected PTI chief's request to transfer the case to another court.
The IHC had directed PTI chief's legal team to take up the matter of maintainability with the trial court again.
The judge of the trial court had sought arguments on maintainability. He had also warned the PTI chief's legal team to present final arguments otherwise the decision would be announced today (Saturday).
However, as the trial court took up the matter today morning, the PTI chief's senior members of legal team were absent. The court took three recesses before announcing the verdict at around noon.
Neither the defendant nor his senior counsels appeared. The PTI chief's junior counsel informed the court that the latter had an appearance before another court.
Issuing the verdict, the trial court declared the PTI chief guilty of corrupt practices and of making a false declaration before the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).
The court directed Islamabad inspector-general of police (IGP) to ensure immediate implementation of arrest warrants.
On October 21, 2022, the ECP had disqualified the former premier in the Toshakhana reference under Article 63(1)(p) of the Constitution for making "false statements and incorrect declaration".
Imran was indicted in the Toshakhana case on May 10 when a trial court rejected his petition challenging the maintainability of the reference.
The PTI chief had challenged the trial court's decision before the IHC, which sent the case back to the trial court for re-examination.