ISLAMABAD - The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's (PTI’s) new media strategy committee has virtually taken control of the party affairs rendering all working groups including elected representatives non-functional - a move resented by the elected ones the most.

To the disappointment of the elected representatives of the party - once major stakeholders in formulating party policy - all the major decisions are being taken by a handful of Khan's loyalists, a considerable chunk of whom are non-elected, sources in the party said. Even the decision to boycott proceedings of the joint sitting of the parliament to be addressed by Turkish President was taken by the media strategy committee on Saturday and most of the PTI lawmakers only heard the decision through TV channels.

The PTI's new media strategy committee, which has started working since Imran Khan's Raiwind rally on September 30, is even working without any formal notification from the party secretariat. An office-bearer of PTI's central secretariat confirmed that no notification has been issued in this connection.

The PTI core committee, a major decision-making body in the party, was dissolved at the end of 2015 when the PTI chief announced to dissolve all party's offices to hold next intra-party polls.

As the party failed to hold the intra-party polls, Khan formed a new Central Advisory Committee (CAC), some months back, as a top decision-making body in place of the core committee having more than 50 members throughout the country. However, the committee had no legal grounds in the light of the party's constitution. The committee is non-functional as none of its meetings was held in the past couple of months, the office bearer said. Then PTI chief started calling party meetings with the name of 'senior party leadership meeting' till the media strategy committee replaced it.

As the non-elected ones started dominating the party decisions, the elected lot feels it all disappointed. "We are not taken on board on major decisions of the party as the media strategy committee is now running all affairs... the decision to boycott the joint sitting was actually taken in a meeting held almost a week before the parliamentary committee was summoned to discuss the issue here on Tuesday," a PTI lawmaker said wishing anonymity. “This is how things have been moving in the party headquarters now a days", the annoyed PTI lawmaker added. The non-elected members of the media strategy committee include Imran Ismail, Ali Zaidi, Faisal Vawda, Walid Iqbal, Faisal Javed Khan, Usman Dar, Umar Cheema, Andleeb Abbas, Dr Yasmin Rashid, Aleem Khan, Hammad Azhar and Fardous Naqvi and others.

The elected members are Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Jehangir Khan Tareen, Shireen Mazari, Asad Umar, Dr Arif Alvi, Ijaz Chaudhry, Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed, Murad Saeed and Dr Manazza Hasan besides others. However, Iftikhar Durrani, the head of the Central Media Department of the PTI says that the strategy committee only deals with the media strategy of the party and has no business with the other party affairs.Durrani, who remains present in every meeting of the strategy committee, while talking to The Nation said that the committee, headed by Khan, meets daily through video link with those PTI leaders in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad who present the party's point of view on current affairs talks shows. "We look into media trends daily, our weaknesses, strengths, the performance with regard to media strategy and take a final decision what line the party would take on talk shows with regard to the Panama leaks issue and other issues," he said.