Imran denies influencing Interior Ministry to remove Bukhari’s name from ECL

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan on Monday rejected news reports that his friend Zulfi Bukhari's name was removed from the Exit Control List (ECL) after he made a phone call. 

"It's my challenge to my opponents to prove that I have called Interior Minister Azam Khan to take off Zulfi Bukhari's name from the ECL," Khan said during an interview to a private news channel. 

Imran added that it was not a crime to travel on a chartered plane.

“There is nothing wrong in going to Umrah on a chartered plane. I didn’t travel on taxpayers’ money,” he said. The PTI chief said that VIP culture is one in which taxpayers money is used for the luxury of few.

"I wouldn’t have been able to perform Umrah on 27th Ramazan, if I had not taken the chartered plane."

The Interior Ministry, in a notification issued on June 11, ordered the immigration authorities to "grant one-time permission to Bukhari for a period of 06 days" to perform Umrah, after he was stopped from travelling to Saudi Arabia earlier today along with Imran Khan.

Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) sources said the London-based businessman was set to fly to Saudi Arabia from Rawalpindi via a charter flight along with Imran and his wife Bushra Maneka, but was stopped from boarding the flight as his name was on the Exit Control List (ECL).