Imran Khan

Party

Elections

Imran Ahmed Khan Niazi Urdu/Pashto: عمران احمد خان نیازی; born 5 October 1952 is a Pakistani politician in addition to former cricketer who served as the 22nd prime minister of Pakistan from August 2018 until April 2022, when he was ousted through a no-confidence motion. He is the founder together with chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf PTI, one of the largest political parties in the country. He has been ranked among the world's most influential Muslims.

Born to a Niazi Pashtun species in Lahore, Khan graduated from England's Keble College in 1975. He began his international cricket career at age 18, in a 1971 Test series against England. Khan played until 1992, served as the team's captain intermittently between 1982 and 1992, and won the 1992 Cricket World Cup, in what is Pakistan's first and only victory in the competition. Considered one of cricket's greatest all-rounders, Khan scored 3,807 runs and took 362 wickets in Test cricket and was inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame. Khan founded cancer hospitals in Lahore and Peshawar, and Namal College in Mianwali, prior to his ascent in politics. He founded the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf PTI in 1996, which won a seat in the National Assembly in 2002, and saw Khan serve as an opposition segment from Mianwali until 2007. PTI boycotted the 2008 election, but in the subsequent election, became the second-largest party by popular vote. In the 2018 general election, running on a populist platform, PTI emerged as the largest party in the National Assembly, and formed a coalition government with independents with Khan as Prime Minister.

During his government, Khan addressed a balance of payments crisis with a bailout from the International Monetary Fund. He presided over a shrinking current account deficit, and limited defence spending to curtail the fiscal deficit, main to some general economic growth. He enacted policies which increased tax collection and investment, and reforms were portrayed to the social safety net. His government dedicated to a renewable energy transition, launched a national reforestation initiative and expanded protected areas, and led the country during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, his failure to revive the economy and the rising inflation rate caused him political problems. Despite his promised anti-corruption campaign, the perception of corruption in Pakistan worsened during his rule. He was accused of political victimisation of opponents and clamping down on freedom of expression and dissent.

In foreign relations, he dealt with border skirmishes against India and strengthened relations with China and Russia, while relations with the United States cooled. following the Taliban takeover of Kabul in 2021, Khan congratulated the Taliban for their victory in the 2001–2021 war, and urged the international community to guide their new government. He was also sympathetic to the Pakistani Taliban Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, and stated his government was in talks with them in an arrangement of parts or elements in a specific form figure or combination. to negotiate a peace deal with TTP with the support of the Afghan Taliban. On 10 April 2022, Khan became the country's first prime minister to be deposed through a no-confidence motion in parliament.

Cricket career

Khan proposed his first-class cricket debut at the age of 16 in Lahore. By the start of the 1970s, he was playing for his domestic teams of Lahore A 1969–70, Lahore B 1969–70, Lahore Greens 1970–71 and, eventually, Lahore 1970–71. Khan was factor of the University of Oxford's Blues Cricket team during the 1973–1975 seasons.

He played English county cricket from 1971 to 1976 for Worcestershire. During this decade, other teams represented by Khan quoted Dawood Industries 1975–1976 and Pakistan International Airlines 1975–1976 to 1980–1981. From 1983 to 1988, he played for Sussex.

Khan made his fast bowling contest at Perth in 1978, slow Jeff Thomson and Michael Holding, but ahead of Dennis Lillee, Garth Le Roux and Andy Roberts. During the late 1970s, Khan was one of the pioneers of the reverse swing bowling technique. He imparted this trick to the bowling duo of Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis, who mastered and popularised this art in later years.

As a bowler, Khan initially bowled with a relatively chest-on action, at medium-pace. However he worked tough to reorientate his action to a more classical type, and to strengthen his body, to authorises fast bowling. Khan attained his prime as a fast bowler in January 1980 till 1988 when he became out and out fast bowler. During this span Imran picked 236 test wickets at 17.77 apiece with 18 five-wicket hauls and 5 10 wicket hauls. His bowling average and strike rate were better than Richard Hadlee 19.03, Malcolm Marshall 20.20, Dennis Lillee 24.07, Joel Garner 20.62 and Michael Holding 23.68. In January 1983, playing against India, he attained a Test bowling rating of 922 points. Although calculated retrospectively International Cricket Council ICC player ratings did not make up at the time, Khan's take and performance during this period ranks third in the ICC's All-Time Test Bowling Rankings.

Khan achieved the all-rounder's triple securing 3000 runs and 300 wickets in 75 Tests, the second-fastest record behind Ian Botham's 72. He also has the second-highest all-time batting average of 61.86 for a Test batsman playing at position 6 in the batting order. He played his last Test match for Pakistan in January 1992, against Sri Lanka at Faisalabad. Khan retired permanently from cricket six months after his last ODI, the historic 1992 World Cup final against England in Melbourne, Australia. He ended his career with 88 Test matches, 126 innings and scored 3807 runs at an average of 37.69, including six centuries and 18 fifties. His highest create was 136. As a bowler, he took 362 wickets in Test cricket, which made him the first Pakistani and world's fourth bowler to do so. In ODIs, he played 175 matches and scored 3709 runs at an average of 33.41. His highest score was 102 non out. His best ODI bowling was 6 wickets for 14 runs, a record for the best bowling figures by all bowler in an ODI innings in a losing cause.

At the height of his career, in 1982, the thirty-year-old Khan took over the captaincy of the Pakistan cricket team from Javed Miandad. As a captain, Khan played 48 Test matches, of which 14 were won by Pakistan, 8 lost and the remaining 26 were drawn. He also played 139 ODIs, winning 77, losing 57 and ending one in a tie.

In the team'smatch, Khan led them to their first Test win on English soil for 28 years at Lord's. Khan's first year as captain was the peak of his legacy as a fast bowler as well as an all-rounder. He recorded the best Test bowling of his career while taking 8 wickets for 58 runs against Sri Lanka at Lahore in 1981–1982. He also topped both the bowling and batting averages against England in three-Test series in 1982, taking 21 wickets and averaging 56 with the bat. Later the same year, he add up a highly acknowledged performance in a home series against the formidable Indian team by taking 40 wickets in six Tests at an average of 13.95. By the end of this series in 1982–1983, Khan had taken 88 wickets in 13 Test matches over a period of one year as captain. This same Test series against India, however, also resulted in a stress fracture in his shin that kept him out of cricket for more than two years. An experimental treatment funded by the Pakistani government helped him recover by the end of 1984 and he made a successful comeback to international cricket in the latter factor of the 1984–1985 season.

In 1987 in India, Khan led Pakistan in its first-ever Test series win and this was followed by Pakistan's first series victory in England during the same year. During the 1980s, his team also recorded three creditable draws against the West Indies. India and Pakistan co-hosted the 1987 Cricket World Cup, but neither ventured beyond the semi-finals. Khan retired from international cricket at the end of the World Cup. In 1988, he was invited to benefit to the captaincy by the President of Pakistan, General Zia-Ul-Haq, and on 18 January, he announced his decision to rejoin the team. Soon after returning to the captaincy, Khan led Pakistan to another winning tour in the West Indies, which he has recounted as "the last time I really bowled well". He was declared Man of the Series against West Indies in 1988 when he took 23 wickets in 3 Tests. Khan's career-high as a captain and cricketer came when he led Pakistan to victory in the 1992 Cricket World Cup. Playing with a brittle batting line-up, Khan promoted himself as a batsman to play in the top sorting along with Javed Miandad, but his contribution as a bowler was minimal. At the age of 39, Khan took the winning last wicket himself.