Pakistan polls 2024: Imran Khan's party PTI claims raids by cops, masked men in election offices, women workers harassed

Ahead of Pakistan elections 2024, trouble is mounting for jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party - Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). Raids are being carried out at houses of party’s election offices, houses of party leaders and supporters. Also, women workers of the political faction are being allegedly harassed. According to a report by Dawn, the PTI alleged that the Punjab Police and some masked men sealed the party’s election office NA-118 nominee Aaliya Hamza and PP-148 candidate Saba Dewan. A spokesman of PTI alleged that the police and unknown masked men harassed women workers sitting in the election office in NA-118 and even went on to warn them that police would not be responsible for their security if they campaigned against the leader of Nawaz Sharif-led PML-N party Hamza Shehbaz. Pakistan will take revenge The PTI spokesman asked: “Will the Election Commission of Pakistan take notice of this fascism?” and said the people of the country would take revenge and defeat the “mafia” with the power of their vote on 8 February. He further claimed that law enforcement personnel abducted a high court lawyer, Khalid Ranjha, and his 70-year-old ailing father by breaking into their house in Sargodha late on Sunday night. Raids in PTI election offices The party spokesman said the lawyer’s only crime was campaigning for PTI candidate Usama Mela in NA-83. He further said the raiding officials ransacked the furniture, broke the doors and vandalised the house. In Pakistan’s Gujrat, PTI nominee for NA-64 Chaudhary Qaisara Elahi and her sister Sameera Elahi, a party candidate from PP-34, accused the police of raiding the Zahoor Elahi House on Sunday night. PTI on raids As per the report, a news conference was called by PTI politicians who claimed the police broke into their house and asked the servants to produce the douments of nominations of polling agents and the list of polling agents. Failing to get the documents, the police allegedly took away a servant and seized a computer, laptop, and voter lists from a room, they alleged. They alleged that police entered the house on a truck and damaged the doors and furniture, while some staff members of Shafay Hussain, the scion of PML-Q chief Chaudhary Shujaat Hussain, were present there to guide the police during the raid. In Multan, veteran politician Javed Hashmi said police raided his house in Makhdoom Rasheed area and picked up his son-in-law, grandson and a servant. His son-in-law Shahid Bahar Hashmi is a PTI-backed candidate. With inputs from agencies