ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party has decided to move a reference against the top official of the country’s election regulatory body, local media said on Sunday, while accusing him of meeting leaders of the rival Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) faction.

The decision to act against the chief election commissioner (CEC), Sikandar Sultan Raja, was taken during a party meeting chaired by Khan on Saturday. The PTI and its leaders have frequently asked Raja to step down while claiming that he is not neutral.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), under Raja’s supervision, is expected to announce a verdict in a case related to the PTI party funding from allegedly dubious international sources in the coming days.

“PTI member of the National Assembly from Islamabad Ali Nawaz Awan told Dawn the decision about the reference was made during the party meeting due to the ‘biased attitude’ of the CEC who the lawmaker said also had been meeting the ruling [PML-N] party leadership,” the Pakistani newspaper reported.

Another PTI leader Chaudhry Fawad Hussain also criticized the top ECP official for meeting the leaders of the ruling coalition while calling it a “sheer violation of code of conduct.”

“Sources in the ECP said it was a matter of routine that political leaders met the CEC but the most number of leaders who had meetings with the CEC belonged to the PTI,” the news report in Dawn added. “They said just a few weeks ago, PTI vice chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi had a meeting with the CEC that lasted for almost one and a half hours.”

Meanwhile, Awan told the newspaper the PTI would participate in by-elections in 11 National Assembly constituencies left by its legislators since the party had unanimously decided not boycott any elections.

PTI lawmakers had resigned en masse from Pakistan’s National Assembly after Khan was ousted from power in a no-confidence vote in April.