Multiple cases have been registered in Punjab province of Pakistan against jailed former prime minister Imran Khan’s wife Bushra Bibi for allegedly speaking against Saudi Arabia, officials said here on Saturday.

At least four cases were registered against Bushra Bibi under the Telegraph Act of 1885 and other provisions on the complaint of citizens who blamed her for inciting religious hatred, misleading the public and attacking a brotherly country, Saudi Arabia, officials said.

In a video statement, Bushra Bibi said Khan’s problems began when he visited Madina and was seen coming out of his plane without shoes.

She claimed then army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa received calls after the incident. “Soon after Khan’s return, Bajwa started getting calls ‘Ye tum kya utha key laa aaye ho (whom have you brought)? We are ending the Sharia system in this country and you have brought promoters of Sharia’,” she said, referring to Khan’s September 2018 visit, in the video released on Thursday.

Incarcerated at the Adiala Jail since last year, Khan, 72, however, defended his wife on Friday and said she “did not mention Saudi Arabia at all” in the video hours after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, and former army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa flayed Bushra Bibi over her comments.

These multiple cases were registered in Dera Ghazi Khan, Gujranwala, Multan, Rajanpur and Muzaffarghar districts of Punjab after Prime Minister Sharif criticised Bushra Bibi on Friday. As the controversy heated up the political atmosphere in the country, Sharif and many other leaders and ministers from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) said strong action will be taken against those trying to sabotage Pak-Saudi relationship.

The video was meant to motivate supporters of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party to join the protest on Sunday in Islamabad but instead kicked up controversy due to the indirect reference towards Saudi Arabia’s alleged role in his ouster from power. Saudi Arabia and China have been two of Pakistan’s biggest supporters helping it tide over the economic crisis.

However, in the 9:27-minute video, which is also available on PTI’s official X handle, Bushra Biwi did not name any country. Apart from defending his wife, Khan – in a post on PTI’s official X account, also asserted that his government’s downfall was orchestrated by Bajwa and accused him of preventing investigations into the alleged conspiracy. Prime Minister Sharif, while addressing a ceremony at Islamabad on Friday, warned the propaganda targeting Saudi Arabia was against the national interest. “A statement has come out yesterday, which I think there can be no greater enmity against Pakistan than this that you spew venom against the country that has never demanded anything in return and always opened its doors for Pakistan,” he said in an apparent reference to Bushra Bibi’s remarks.

General Bajwa too swiftly refuted Bushra Bibi’s claim and termed her statement – while talking to the media — as a “pack of lies,” asking how a friendly country could interfere in Pakistan’s internal affairs.

Defence minister Asif Khawaja, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar and Information Minister Atta Tarar too flayed her remarks.

Not just the ruling party coalition leaders, the claim by Khan’s wife has taken even the PTI leaders by surprise and they are now questioning the controversial statement, issued ahead of the party’s Sunday protest in Islamabad.

In a post on X, PTI activist and singer Salman Ahmad called Bushra Bibi “corrupt and greedy” and said it was “disgusting” to say that the ex-PM was removed because he walked barefoot in Madina. PTI MZ

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