Last Updated: October 26, 2023, 19:08 IST
Khan was later freed on bail in the case but remains behind bars in connection with the cipher case. (Representative image/News18)
Khadija Shah, Gen Asif Nawaz Janjua’s granddaughter and a fashion designer by profession, was among several women arrested for their alleged involvement in attacks on military installations on May 9 that erupted in the wake of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf: party chief Khan’s arrest in a corruption case
The granddaughter of a former army chief and a leader of ex-prime minister Imran Khan’s party who was arrested for her alleged involvement in the May 9 violence has written an open letter from jail seeking “empathy and humanity” party’s 19 women prisoners including herself.
Khadija Shah, Gen Asif Nawaz Janjua’s granddaughter and a fashion designer by profession, was among several women arrested for their alleged involvement in attacks on military installations on May 9 that erupted in the wake of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf: party chief Khan’s arrest in a corruption case.
Khan was later freed on bail in the case but remains behind bars in connection with the cipher case. Shah who was granted a post-arrest bail last week was arrested again and has now written a five-page handwritten letter which was shared by her husband on the PTI’s official account on X on Wednesday, describing the heart-wrenching accounts of “separation, pain, and suffering” among the party’s women prisoners.
Shah noted she has been incarcerated for over four months for “peacefully participating” in the May 9 protest. “Each PTI woman prisoner at Kot Lakhpat Jail Lahore has borne unimaginable punishment,” she wrote in the letter.
Writing about the plight of 18 “innocent women” imprisoned alongside her, Shah said, “These women prisoners have no access to the world and are unable to share their plight; their families desperately struggling to balance the demands of life without them.”
“The women incarcerated with me have suffered unbearable circumstances, and they are waiting for the world to take notice and speak for them. These 18 women in captivity aren’t just 18 women. They are 18 homes, 18 families, and countless lives completely shattered and at a standstill. I want to share the tragedy that is unfolding with each passing day to elicit the empathy and humanity that must exist in us all,” the letter read.
She said the stories of separation, pain and suffering of May 9 prisoners are endless. “Each one of the prisoners has borne a punishment too great to imagine. A heavy price has been paid.” “Whether you are a supporter of the PTI or not, humanity dictates that this trial be brought to an end,” she said, adding that it was time that all came together for the common good.
“Whether we are supporters of a political party or members of an institution, we are all Pakistanis and one people,” she wrote.
Although some of the women prisoners got bail, they were re-arrested in other cases, a pattern applied to the PTI leaders allegedly involved in the May 9 incidents.
At least 10,000 PTI leaders and workers were arrested across the country for allegedly attacking and setting ablaze the state and military installations including the army’s headquarters in Rawalpindi and ISI building in Faisalabad city on May 9.
A number of PTI’s women supporters and leaders were also detained despite appeals that mercy should be shown to them.
However, the military establishment declared that all those involved in attacking the army installations would face the music irrespective of gender.
Gen Janjua served as the fourth Chief of Army Staff from August 1991 until his death in January 1993.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed – PTI)
