Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry Thursday rejected the notion that the military establishment was now supporting the opposition, saying that the armed forces continued to stand with the government as required under the Constitution.

Chaudhry's remarks were in reply to a reporter's question about the "impression that opposition parties now had the "army or establishment's support" in their bid to oust Prime Minister Imran Khan from the top office through a vote of no-confidence.

"In our constitutional scheme, the army has to stay with the government," Chaudhry said at a press conference in Islamabad today. "The army has to follow the Constitution, and it will follow the Constitution."

At the outset of his speech, the information minister said a meeting of the political committee was held earlier in the day where concerns were raised over a "campaign against the Pakistan Army".

Fawad started his news conference with the video clip of Tuesday’s joint presser of opposition parties’ heads where Maulana Fazlur Rehman expressed his keen interest in “reforming the state institutions”. It was in fact the restart of their attempts to get a stranglehold over the state institutions through their so-called reforms, he added.

Both Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Nawaz Sharif and Jamiat Ulema-e Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Fazlur Rehman wanted to exercise same control on a specific institution like the former had on the Punjab police while he was in power, he claimed.

Fazl’s statement, he added, had exposed the opposition’s plans for the “political control” on the institution. “This is not a starter,” he said while playing the documentary of a private news channel on the ‘Memogate scandal’ revealing that the then president Asif Ali Zardari had reached out to the American Establishment to save his government in the aftermath of the Abbottabad episode.

The video clips, he said, highlighted as to how all three leaders, including Asif Zardari, Fazlur Rehman and Nawaz Sharif had hatched conspiracies against the state institutions.

Some video clips showing the PML-N leaders’ critical statements against the state institutions in the wake of the “Dawn Leaks”, were also played at the presser to reinforce the PTI’s claim about the party’s involvement in such campaigns.

Commenting on the meetings of Nawaz Sharif, as a prime minister, with the Indian businessmen, he said an Indian journalist Barkha Dutt in her book reported that Nawaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Narendera Modi also had secret meetings in Kathmandu, which had not been denied by anybody so far.

Modi was continuously spitting venom against the Pakistan Army at that time, but Nawaz invited him to the wedding ceremony of his granddaughter (in Pakistan), he added.

One of the video clips also contained an interview of a former Foreign Office spokesperson, claiming that there were standing instructions from the then prime minister Nawaz Sharif barring the FO from adopting the anti-India stance.

Commenting on the above clip, the minister said ironically such policy directives were issued from the then prime minister’s office at a time when Modi was giving inappropriate statements against the then army chief.

Unfortunately, he said, the politics of the “family of conspirators” still continued as evident from Nawaz’s persistent public onslaught against the armed forces (since his disqualification) and his Maryam Safdar was treading on the same path.

A clip of Maryam was also shown in which she was appreciating the party workers for raising slogans against the soldiers.

Chaudhry addressed the opposition's objection to PM Imran's criticism of European Union (EU) countries for asking Pakistan to vote against Russia during the recently held special session of the United Nations General Assembly.

He wondered why the prime minister's rebuke of EU countries had the opposition worried and then asked for clip to be played in which PML-N leader Hamza Shehbaz was seen criticising PM Imran on the issue.

Chaudhry said the opposition's reaction equated to questioning "why does Pakistan have an independent foreign policy?"

He further remarked that the no-trust motion had been submitted because the foreign policy of "absolutely not" and criticising EU countries had perturbed the opposition. "But should we protect their assets in Europe and London, or should we move forward with an independent foreign policy?" Chaudhry posed a rhetoric question.

He said Pakistan wanted good ties with all countries, but not at the cost of its self-respect.

Chaudhry dubbed the opposition's move to seek a no-confidence against PM Imran a "political drama", saying that "we want them to end before" March 23.

He said delegations from Muslim countries around the world would start arriving in Islamabad on March 21 to attend a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Council's foreign ministers. These foreign ministers, he said, would also attend the parade on March 23, on the occasion of Pakistan Day, to which representative of European countries were also invited.

"So we want that that this political drama ends before that," he said.

The minister said the government was confident about succeeding against the opposition on the no-trust motion and had the support of all its allies.

"We might also get some extra votes," he added.

He further said the speaker had the authority to reject the votes of lawmakers who would go against their parties' mandates.

To a question about when the session for voting on the no-confidence motion would be held, he said it was a matter for the NA speaker to decide.

In reply to another question, he said that apparently, under Article 63 (1) A, leader of the party has to decide whether a member had crossed the floor and then speaker gives a declaration on it.

Asked whether this also applied to the allies, he said, "no, the allies have their own parliamentary party".

When asked about Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar, Chaudhry said he was the province's chief executive because PM Imran and the PTI's parliamentary party had confidence in him.

"But our focus for now is on the no-confidence motion. We will work on big decisions regarding Punjab, but not right now," he added.

To a question about reports of a "foreign hand" being behind the no-confidence motion and whether it was rooted in India, he replied, "Tehreek-i-Labbaik was getting support from India and it was never denied."

He further said the PTI had received assurances of support from all of its allies and that the party would remain in contact with the leaders of the estranged Jahangir Tareen group. "We will give a united response," he said.