Reham Khan, the tell-all book back in news thanks to Imran Khan's leaked phone calls
(photo-DailyO)
It was July 2018. Pakistan's playboy cricketer-turned-politician was contesting the country's general elections while his ex-wife, Reham Khan, was out and about promoting a book. The timing of the book was suspect. It was labelled 'agenda' by Imran Khan's party. There were efforts to slander Reham Khan and her book, but the 500-odd-page memoir survived the onslaught.
Imran Khan won the elections soon after and became Pakistan's 22nd Prime Minister. Reham Khan continued with her career as a journalist while appearing on TV news debates whenever her former husband did something of note.
This week, the former Khan couple has been making news for reasons polar opposite. While Reham has announced her (third) wedding to US-based former actor Mirza Bilal Baig, Imran Khan is facing a full-blown sex scandal involving, allegedly, a former PTI colleague.
So, it is only justified that we talk about this book today.
Reham Khan, after all, wrote in lurid detail about Imran Khan's 'preferences', from drugs to deviances. The former cricketer's 'confessions' about his illegitimate children ('he told me he has five, including Indian children,' said Reham back in 2018) are part of the book. She writes about Imran pleasuring himself to 'images of male bodies'. She devotes much paper and ink to Khan's sexual life; from empty cigar cases to tubes of KY jelly. Reham also names Ayla Malik 10 times in her book (Malik's name has come up in connection with Imran Khan's phone calls.)
"Belgian shepherds are hard work, but I realised that they were still easier than most grown men," is just one of the many attacks by Reham towards her suitors and ex-husbands. She did have only praise for one Indian man though: Shah Rukh Khan.
Reham Khan the book and its eponymous writer had their moment in the sun all through Imran Khan's campaigns. There's little literary value here, truth be told, but then, who picks up a book on Imran Khan expecting spirituality and piety no matter how much he would like you to believe he has 'changed'! Khan's third marriage, to the seer Bushra Maneka, did hardly anything to bury his Casanova image. And now, Imran Khan's graphic, detailed, leaked phone calls all seem to point at Reham Khan having written the truth in her book. Maybe the world was too quick to dismiss the memoir as 'agenda'.