The country's political landscape on Monday took a significant turn as disgruntled PTI leader and sugar baron Jahangir Tareen visited former PTI leader Abdul Aleem Khan at his residence.
The meeting took place after Aleem extended an invitation for lunch to Tareen and his supporters.
The gathering was attended by current and former personalities affiliated with the PTI.
Prominent politicians, including Ishaq Khakwani, former SAPM Aun Chaudhry, Shoaib Siddiqui and Saeed Akbar Nawani, were present on the occasion.
According to sources, Tareen is expected to hold a news conference with key political leaders in the next 72 hours during which he is likely to announce the formation of a new political party.
Read PTI faces existential threat as more leaders quit
The news conference will be attended by politicians who distanced themselves from the PTI, along with Tareen.
The sources revealed that Tareen would soon submit an application for the registration of the new party to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).
It was said that important political figures from Dera Ghazi Khan, Rajanpur, Muzaffargarh, Vehari, Lodhran, and Multan are also likely to join the new party.
The disgruntled PTI leader is known to wield influence over important leaders from Karachi, interior Sindh, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Tareen, who was once a confidant of Imran and helped the PTI form government in Punjab in 2018, developed differences with the PTI chief after the latter allowed the Federal Investigation Agency to lay hands on him in the sugar scam case in early 2021.
Read more No respite for PTI leaders as crackdown continues
Later, Tareen’s group of 25 MPAs, including Aleem Khan, was instrumental in toppling the PTI-led Punjab government. These lawmakers had voted in favour of PML-N’s Hamza Shehbaz for the chief minister election in April last year.
In December 2017, the Supreme Court disqualified Tareen, who was the PTI secretary general at that time, declaring that he had proven dishonest under Article 62(1)(f) of the Constitution and Section 99 of Representation of People Act (ROPA) on one count among the multiple charges brought against him.
On September 27, 2018, the same apex court bench rejected a review petition filed by him.
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