Khan's penchant for dispensing with a far reaching political strategy can be traced back to his cricketing days. The man who charged down to the bowling crease to deliver an yorker or hit a short ball to the ropes rode the crest of a popularity wave to the prime minister's office preferred to envelop himself in a momentum of motion. Khan wants such momentum to continue in his political career. But politics is a different ball game altogether.

The former Pakistani Prime Minister is at a loss when there is no wind in his sail. He is a square peg in a round hole when he tries to sit down and plan a move after digging in his heels. One wonders whether Imran Khan might bounce back to a position of reckoning in Pakistani politics. The possibility cannot be ruled out but political watchers in Pakistan feel it would be nothing short of a political miracle.

But miracles happen only once in a while. Khan was a threat to the Pakistani establishment a year ago and seemed to posses the potential to destabilise the system of which he had been a central cog in not too distant past. The former Prime Minister possessed a popular support base among the common people. Most significant pointer to his extent of support was that it could be traced to the ranks of the men in uniform- the army.

But an overreach by Khan's supporters after his arrest on May 9 when they vandalized army establishments turned the tide in favour of army chief of staff, General Asim Munir. The cricketing parlance "hit wicket" explains the situation in a nutshell to Khan, an outstanding cricketer and many of his fans whose adulation to the sportsman turned politician emanate from the cricketing exploits of the former prime minister now marking time behind the bars.

The successes on the playing fields came to Khan in a flash sans much tweaking of plans and policies. But it is just the other way round in politics which besides waiting and watching, involves thinking of one's next move and that of his opponent the ways and means of which the imprisoned leader is not conversant with.

The attack on army property gave Munir an opportunity he had not bargained for. Moreover, the general had support from Khan's civilian rivals who helped the man in uniform to turn the push into a shove. The army, as always, was well placed to exploit the rifts within the political class. Impulsiveness of Khan's supporters gave it an unexpected opportunity to perpetuate its centrality in the country's political order.

Khan had overlooked the army's role as a part of the nucleus of Pakistan's power structure. He did not even care to jog his memory to recall that army had rigged the 2018 election after Nawaz Sharif's ouster to install him in the prime minister's office.

It was the army who had encouraged Khan to mount massive street protests against Sharif's regime. But accustomed to attaining quick success by bat or ball in the cricket field and thereafter in politics, the former skipper of Pakistani cricket team took the army's gift as an entitlement. Eventually, Imran Khan was removed from office last year by army chief, Qumar Javed Bajwa. Now Munir is trying to destabilise him in politics.

If Khan never let go a loose ball or bowled to the discomfort of the leading batsmen, as a Prime Minister he baulked at going by IMF conditionalities which would impose immense economic hardships on the people of Pakistan. To push through the unpopular economic reforms by the caretaker government, Munir seems set to delay the next delay the elections due next year; the man in uniform scores over the individual in mufti in this aspect. (IPA Service)