PTI: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Pakistan Movement for Justice. PTI is currently in power in the country. It is ruling political party of Pakistan. Imran Khan, a former Pakistani cricketer turned politician, created it in 1996. PTI, together with PML-N and PPP, is one of Pakistan’s three main political parties, and the largest country in terms of seats in the National Assembly as of the 2018 Pakistani general election. It claimed to be largest political party by primary membership of Pakistan and one of the world’s largest political parties of Pakistan with over 10 million members in Pakistan and overseas.
Despite Khan’s fame, the party had minimal success in its early years. In the 1997 elections, it failed to receive a single seat, and in 2002, only Khan was able to secure a seat for the party. The party remained opposed to the pro-Musharraf PML-Q government and eventually boycotted the 2008 election, alleging it of being held in a dishonest manner.
In opposition to the center-left PPP and the center-right PML-N, the growth of Third Way during the Musharraf era formed a new moderate party in Pakistani politics. When the popularity of PML-Q began to dwindle after presidency of Musharraf ended, PTI took up a large portion of its moderate vote.
Due to its populism perspective, the PTI attracted too many former voters of PPP, notably in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, as the popularity of PPP began to dwindle following disqualification Prime Minister Yousaf Raza in 2012.
PTI gained nearly 7.5 million votes in the 2013 elections, placing it 2nd in the number of votes cast and 3rd in the number of seats won. In KPK, PTI was elected to power at the provincial level. During its period in opposing party, the PTI gathered people in protests over public discontent on a variety of issues, the most prominent of which being the 2014 Azadi March, with slogans like Tabdeeli Arahi Hai.
PTI got 16.9 million votes in 2018, the most of any political party in Pakistan. For the first time, it established the government of Pakistan in alliance with five other parties, with Imran Khan as Prime Minister of Pakistan The party is now in power at the national level and in the provinces of KPK and Punjab as of 2020. It is also a member of the Balochistan alliance government and the largest opposition party in Sindh.
