Former prime minister and PTI Chairman Imran Khan will attend a public gathering in Chishtian city of the Punjab province, resuming his campaigning after cancelling public rallies in Karachi and Peshawar following devastating floods in the country. Imran Khan will be joining campaigning for by-election in PP-241 after the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) announced to hold by elections on 11 constituencies vacated after resignations of the PTI MNAs. Imran Khan is contesting on all seats as the candidate. PPP leader Aon Abbas visited the venue of public gathering on Wednesday along with the local PTI leaders and reviewed arrangements for the public rally. Imran Khan has suspended his political campaigning to visit flood-affected areas in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and arranging a telethon to get pledges of Rs5 billion funds for the flood victims in the country.

Imran Khan on Monday held an international telethon to raise funds from within the country and overseas Pakistanis for the flood victims. According to Senator Faisal Javed Khan, who moderated the event, the former prime minister collected over Rs5 billion in donations in 3 hours long flood telethon. Chief ministers of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa — Pervaiz Elahi and Mahmood Khan — former premier’s ex-assistant on social protection Sania Nishtar, celebrities, and other politicians joined Imran Khan’s telethon. Speaking during Live Telethon which was telecast by a number of TV channels, the PTI chief said entire Pakistan had been affected by the floods generated by back-to-back monsoon rains. He said more than 1000 people died due to devastating floods and the damages are expected to cross Rs1,000 billion. He said that the country would have to construct more dams to save people from such devastation in future. “The sole solution to prevent the catastrophes caused by flood is to construct dams.”

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-INP