LAHORE - The PTI which has been staging Azadi sit-in for the last 28 days in the federal capital has started facing funds shortage to continue the campaign for an indefinite time, The Nation has learnt.
Imran Khan who is apparently not ready to call off the sit-in without the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is deeply perturbed over this issue.
Senior aides of the PTI chairman privy to the developments on this count told this correspondent on Wednesday that it was becoming difficult to meet the expenses of the Azadi sit-in as the party leaders who were funding the drive had politely refused to run the campaign from the revenues of their personal business concerns.
They revealed funds to run the Azadi march that later turned into a sit-in were being managed by some business tycoons of Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the funds flowing in from abroad.
Keeping in view the situation, the party is expected to launch a fund-raising campaign soon, which is likely to be led by Asad Umar under the supervision of the party chairman.
When asked about the volume of the funds utilised for the campaign so far, they said billions of rupees had been spent, but refused to give the exact figures.
The PTI chief’s senior aides said the party supporters from abroad were also cutting the funds in view of the indefinite time period of the Azadi sit-in, while some of them had stopped funding for this purpose.
A senior party leader, commenting upon the issue, said: “Had 150,000 marchers been in the march at the time of entering the federal capital, this entire episode might have been wrapped up in 72 hours and no issue of funds scarcity would have arisen today.” He revealed: “We had not planned the Azadi sit-in for more than three days, but failed to amass a large number of marchers to build up pressure on the government as well as the establishment to seriously ponder over our demands for the prime minister’s resignation and fresh elections under a reformed electoral system.”
Meanwhile, some of the PTI leaders have advised the high command to take some solid steps to provide relief to the flood victims as PML-N and other opposition parties are criticising the PTI leadership for its failure on this count.
According to them, they criticised the advisers of the party chairman at the recent party meetings over their failure to devise a policy for flood-relief activities. They added only a single tour of Imran Khan to the flood-affected areas could not counter the propaganda campaign of its opponents, so the party chairman should announce a schedule for marathon rounds of the flooded areas and carry out flood-relief activities.
They opined such a plan could help rejuvenate the dying Azadi sit-in which was becoming thinner with each passing day.
Dr Yasmin Rashid, PTI core committee member, when contacted, claimed: “Imran Khan Foundation is carrying out flood-relief activities.” She, however, avoided commenting upon flood-relief activities from the PTI platform.