Ex Pakistan PM Imran Khan's mental stability 'questionable,' claims health minister

Pakistan's Health Minister Abdul Qadir Patel on Friday said that Imran Khan's mental stability is questionable and alleged that the former prime minister's urine sample showed evidence of toxic chemicals like alcohol and cocaine. Addressing a press conference on the medical reports of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party chief issued after the collection of samples at the premier Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) here following his arrest in the Al-Qadir Trust corruption case on May 9.

This is your prime minister about whom a five-member panel of senior doctors is saying that his mental stability is questionable. There was some inappropriate gesture, he said, adding that 70-year-old Khan's medical report will be shown to the nation, as it was a public document. The medical report is saying that when we talked to Imran for a long time, his actions were not that of a fit man, Dawn News quoted the minister as saying.

Patel also alleged that the initial report of Khan's urine sample revealed findings of toxic chemicals, the likes of alcohol and cocaine. The minister also claimed that there was no mention of any fracture on the leg in Khan's medical reports while he went around with a plaster on his leg for five to six months". Khan survived an assassination attempt on November 3 last year during a march against the federal government in Punjab province. He was shot in the shin and thigh on the right leg.

Have you ever seen anyone having himself plastered for a wound on the skin or muscle? Patel asked. The minister said he would write to the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) disciplinary body on doctors "wrongly" declaring the cricketer-turned-politician's leg fractured. While terming the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman a narcissist, Patel said the former prime minister should be kept in a museum.

Being a narcissist, he is insistent on his lies and calls them the truth. This narcissist has been inciting people and diverting the youth to the wrong path, he added. Khan's medical report was made public amid a crackdown on the PTI and its supporters for the violence that erupted across Pakistan following the arrest of Khan from the premises of the Islamabad High Court in a corruption case. Official figures estimate the violence left more than 10 persons dead while the PTI claims more than 40 of its workers were killed and thousands injured in the May 9 mayhem.

The Pakistan government and the Army have termed the violence on May 9 as a "Black Day" in the history of Pakistan. Some of the top leaders of PTI are in jail while some others have quit the party and public life. Khan, his wife Bushra Bibi and more than 600 leaders and former assembly members of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party have been barred from leaving the country. Pakistan's Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said on Wednesday the government was mulling a possible ban on Khan's PTI party following the attacks by his supporters on military installations after the former prime minister's arrest.