PTI leaders rally behind Tareen

ISLAMABAD: Top PTI leadership rallied behind Jahangir Khan Tareen after Shah Mehmood Qureshi publicly criticized the politician from Lodhran for attending cabinet and other official meetings.

Jahangir Khan Tareen was disqualified from holding public office by the Supreme Court of Pakistan just months before election that saw PTI come to power.

Speaking at a press conference, Foreign Minister  Qureshi said although he still admires Tareen for his services, his presence at official meetings provide the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz opportunity to criticize the government.

He questioned the party’s logic for criticizing Nawaz Shahrif who was disqualified under 62 (1)(F), the same article which Supreme Court invoked to disqualify Jahangir Tareen.

“If 62 applies to Nawaz Sharif, he becomes disqualified from holding party position and public office, but when the same applies to us the standards becomes different,” he said.

The minister said Jahangir Tareen should himself think that when he sits in the official meetings, Maryam Aurangzeb finds the pretext to speak against the government.

Tareen responds

Responding to Qureshi’s diatribe, Jahangir Khan Tareen said he was responsible to Imran Khan who happens to be his only leader.

“There is only one man in my life whom I consider my leader and to whom I am answerable. His name is Imran Khan. I have stood by his side through thick and thin and will continue to do so till my last breath. What others may say for their own strange reasons does not concern me,” Tareen wrote on Twitter.

Both PTI bigwigs first came face to face over distribution of party tickets for 2018 election and later over the selection of cabinet members and their portfolios.

Imran Khan had also admitted during a TV interview that there were two groups in the PTI being led by Qureshi and Tareen.

In another interview with Hamid Mir, he had said that the differences between the two would not become a trouble.

During the recent spat, Fawad Chaudhry, Murad Saeed, Pervez Khattak, Faisal Vawda and some other leaders of the party have voiced support for Tareen.