ISLAMABAD: An Islamabad district and sessions court on Monday rejected former prime minister Imran Khan’s plea seeking suspension of non-bailable arrest warrants issued for him, local media reported, a day after the ex-premier evaded arrest following hours of drama in the eastern city of Lahore.

The same court had on Feb 28 issued the non-bailable arrest warrants for Khan over his repeated absence in a case involving the sale of gifts Khan received as the prime minister, which has come to be popularly known as the Toshakhana (state repository) reference.

On Monday, Additional Sessions Judge Zafar Iqbal announced the already reserved verdict after hearing arguments by Khan’s attorneys on his plea seeking cancelation of his warrants, Pakistan’s Geo News channel reported.

“The PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) chief could have approached the Islamabad High Court for the suspension of the warrant,” the judge was quoted as saying before announcing the verdict.

On Sunday, an Islamabad police team reached Khan’s residence in Lahore with the court summons. The team, however, returned empty-handed when the situation got tensed after the ex-premier’s supporters blocked its entry to his home.

In a landmark ruling in October last year, Pakistan’s election watchdog had disqualified Khan from holding a public office over his failure to declare proceeds from the sale of state gifts in his statement of assets filed with the regulator.

Khan’s party maintains that it is not “humanly possible” for the ex-premier to simultaneously appear in all 74 cases registered against him, including the ones on charges of prohibited funding, terrorism and attempted murder.

“The government wants to provoke PTI workers, create law and order situation” to avoid going to elections as per a recent ruling of the Supreme Court, Chaudhry Fawad Hussain, a close Khan aide, told reporters in Lahore on Sunday.

After weeks of tug of war between the government and the opposition PTI party, the apex court decided to intervene in the matter and asked the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to propose dates for elections in the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) provinces.

Khan’s PTI party and allies dissolved the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial assemblies in January, in a bid to force the government of PM Shehbaz Sharif to announce nationwide polls. The two provinces account for more than half of the country’s 220 million population.

Khan’s PTI has been gambling on the Sharif government being unable to afford to hold the provincial elections separately from the nationwide election, which is otherwise due by October.  

Under the Pakistani law, fresh polls for the two provincial assemblies should be held within 90 days of their dissolution.