Daily Times

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Jahangir Tareen said on Thursday he was shocked at the false allegations levelled against him in the sugar inquiry report, which was released earlier in the day after approval of Prime Minister Imran Khan.

The premier’s aide on accountability, Shahzad Akbar, had made the report public in a press briefing, and said, “[The report] confirms the premier’s long-held view that businessmen in politics will put business first”.

Tareen, responding to report and the briefing, said, “I am shocked at the kind of false allegations levelled against me. I have always run a clean business. All Pakistan knows I always pay full price to my growers.”

“I DO NOT maintain 2 sets of books. I pay all my taxes diligently. I will answer every allegation and be vindicated IA,” he said.

For his part, PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif said that the report is “nothing but falsehood” and that the commission did not record the statement of the “real culprit Imran Khan”.

Talking to a private news channel, he said that PM Imran was behind the scandal. “My children have been named in the inquiry report but they did not export sugar.”

Meanwhile, PML-N’s Malik Ahmad Khan said that the federal and Punjab governments did not hold anyone responsible for providing subsidies. “They had to identify the ones responsible [for giving subsidies] in the report, which they failed to do,” he said, adding, “Was action taken against those who gave false reports to the prime minister?”

“The inquiry commission’s main objective was to probe the export of one million tonnes worth of sugar which they did not do,” he said.

Reacting to the statement, Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML-Q) leader Moonis Elahi, in a tweet, said: “As stated earlier I am not involved in the management nor am I on the board of any Sugar Mill.”

“I strongly support the recommendation of commission to control satta/speculation including new legislation to help government control sugar price manipulation,” he said.

Talking about Sindh, the provincial government’s spokesperson, Murtaza Wahab, said that the report which Akbar presented was based on “false allegations”. “The inquiry commission had to probe the matters pertaining to the years 2019 and 2020,” he said, adding, “2017 and 2018 were not mentioned in the TORs or maybe they are trying to save some people”.

Wahab said they had reservations if the commission’s goal was to “pinpoint political opponents”. He said Punjab gave subsidy in 2019-20. “Those who are responsible for this act should be handcuffed but they need to identify them. Centre permitted sugar export, not Sindh,” he said.