Imran Khan, whose full name is Imran Ahmad Khan Niazi, was born on October 5, 1952, in Lahore, Pakistan. He is a Pakistani cricket player, politician, philanthropist, and prime minister of Pakistan (2018–22). Imran Khan first rose to prominence as captain of Pakistan’s national team in 1992, when they won the Cricket World Cup. Later, he entered politics as an opponent of the country’s widespread corruption.

Early life and cricket career

Imran Khan was educated at prestigious institutions in Pakistan and the United Kingdom, including the Royal Grammar School in Worcester and Aitchison College in Lahore. He was born into a wealthy Pashtun family in Lahore.

His family included several talented cricketers, including two older cousins who captained the Pakistani national team, Javed Burki and Majid Khan. In his teenage years, Imran Khan played cricket in Pakistan and the UK. He continued to play while attending the University of Oxford to study philosophy, politics, and economics.

Imran Khan participated in his first international game for Pakistan in 1971, but it wasn’t until 1976—the year he graduated from Oxford—that he was given a permanent spot on the team.

Imran Khan became the captain of the Pakistani squad in 1982 after establishing himself as a superb bowler and all-around player by the early 1980s. Khan became well-known in Pakistan and England thanks to his athletic prowess and attractive appearance, and the British tabloid press used his frequent appearances in upscale London nightclubs as material.

Imran Khan’s biggest sporting accomplishment came in 1992, when he helped Pakistan win its first World Cup title by defeating England in the championship game. He made history as one of the best cricket players when he retired the same year.

Imran Khan continued to be known as a philanthropist after 1992. He had a spiritual transformation that led him to embrace Sufi mysticism and let go of his previous playboy persona. Khan served as the main fund-raiser for the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital, a specialised cancer hospital in Lahore, which opened in 1994, as part of his charitable work. Khan’s mother, who passed away from cancer in 1985, inspired the naming of the hospital.

Entry into politics

Imran Khan became been an outspoken opponent of Pakistan’s corrupt politics after he retired from cricket. In 1996, he established Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, often known as the Pakistan Justice Movement (PTI).

The newly founded party performed marginally better in the 2002 elections, taking home one National Assembly seat that Khan filled, but it still received fewer than 1% of the vote in the national elections conducted the following year.

Imran Khan was one of a number of legislators that left the National Assembly in October 2007 in opposition to President Pervez Musharraf’s bid for reelection. Khan was briefly detained in November as part of a campaign against Musharraf’s detractors after the general proclaimed a state of emergency.

The PTI boycotted the 2008 national elections in opposition to Musharraf’s authority and denounced the emergency declaration, which was lifted in mid-December.

Despite the PTI’s electoral difficulties, Khan’s populist views were well-liked, particularly among young people. He persisted in criticising Pakistan’s economic disparity and corruption, and he was against Pakistan’s government working with the US to combat extremists close to the Afghan border.

He also launched attacks on Pakistan’s political and business leaders, claiming they were Westernised and out of touch with the country’s traditional values.

Political ascent

Imran Khan and his party garnered sizable crowds to their rallies in the months before the legislative elections planned for early 2013 as well as the endorsement of numerous seasoned lawmakers from Pakistan’s major parties. A 2012 poll declared Khan to be the most well-liked politician in Pakistan, providing further proof of his burgeoning electoral fortunes.

Khan suffered head and back injuries when he fell from a platform during a campaign rally just a few days before the May 2013 legislative elections. Hours later, from his hospital bed, he appeared on television to make one last plea to voters.

The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), led by Nawaz Sharif, won more seats than the PTI in the elections, but it still won fewer than half of those seats. Khan said that the PML-N rigged the election. He and other opposition leaders spearheaded four months of rallies in late 2014 to put pressure on Sharif to resign after their calls for an investigation remained unanswered.

Although Sharif was not removed by the protests, accusations of corruption were increased when the Panama Papers revealed that his family had offshore holdings. Late in 2016, Khan planned a new round of protests but abruptly canceled them after the Supreme Court decided to launch an inquiry.

Nawaz Sharif was compelled to retire from his position as a result of the probe, which rendered him ineligible to hold public office in 2017. Khan, meanwhile, had offshore holdings that were also made public, but the Supreme Court did not disqualify him in a different case.

In July of the following year, elections were held. Khan ran on a platform of eradicating poverty and corruption, while having to defend himself against claims that he was too friendly with the military establishment.

Given that the PTI gained the majority of seats in the National Assembly, Khan was free to pursue a coalition with independent lawmakers. On August 18, he was appointed prime minister.

Premiership

When Imran Khan was prime minister, a balance-of-payments crisis was growing. Despite the economy’s expansion, imports and debt obligations from before his administration have risen in recent years, largely as a result of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project.

Only a few weeks into his tenure as prime minister, the issue grew worse when Pakistan’s efforts to combat terrorism were deemed insufficient by the United States, which withheld $300 million in pledged military aid.

Imran Khan first tried to obtain aid from “friendly countries” abroad; but, since the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had already provided Pakistan with 12 bailout packages that had failed to address the country’s macroeconomic issues, the public was growing weary of the IMF.

However, Pakistan requested an emergency loan from the IMF after failing to obtain external assistance on favorable terms from other nations. Later, he received pledges of investments from China, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates while he continued to look for foreign assistance from other sources.

Political activity after being removed from office

Imran Khan faced criticism nonetheless because of his tight ties to the military establishment, his campaign against extremists, and the precarious status of the economy. The Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), a coalition of the main opposition parties, was established in late 2020 with the declared purpose of improving the independence of the civilian government from the military establishment.

Imran Khan was called to resign in protests and rallies organized by the PDM, who charged him with being an army puppet. These parties abstained from a vote of confidence Khan’s cabinet called in March 2021, which Khan narrowly won with the help of his coalition allies. Following a failed attempt by Khan to influence the military establishment’s key appointments, the two fell out later that year.

In March 2022, the opposition planned to organize its own vote of confidence as anger over ongoing inflation increased. Important PTI partners left the government coalition, and some PTI members also left the party. Following the vote, Khan was ousted as prime minister for the first time in Pakistan’s history on April 10 as a result of a motion of no confidence,eviction from office and subsequent Under the new Shehbaz Sharif-led PML-N administration, the economy only became worse, paving the way for the PTI to make a stunning comeback months after it was toppled.

In a shocking landslide victory, the PTI won 15 of the 20 seats up for election in Punjab province’s legislature in July 2022. Punjab is Pakistan’s largest province and has always been a bastion for the PML-N.

However, Khan encountered tremendous obstacles when attempting to capitalize on his popularity in rallies conducted across the nation. He received criticism in August for expressing intent to sue judges and police personnel in Islamabad during a speech.

After that speech, he was charged, marking the start of a slew of legal issues in the months to come. He was temporarily prohibited from holding public office in October after the electoral commission claimed that he had engaged in corrupt behavior.

He was shot in the leg in what appears to have been an assassination attempt in November while leading a protest caravan from the city of Lahore to Islamabad.Politics-related activity