FLANKED by local PTI leaders, Salman Akram Raja addresses a press conference in Lahore.—PPI • Salman Akram Raja says critics are ‘hard of hearing’, claims party has emerged as largest social force in the country • Junaid Akbar Khan terms Balochistan ‘guarantor of country’s stability’, assails govt over law and order situation LAHORE / QUETTA: Deflecting criticism that the party has lost its way in the face of government intransigence, leaders of the main opposition PTI maintained that securing Imran Khan’s freedom remained their “ultimate objective”. In separate interactions with the media on Thursday, PTI Secretary General Salman Akram Raja and the party’s KP Chapter President Junaid Akbar Khan pilloried the government and attempted to brush aside the impression that the party had become side-tracked from the founder’s mission. Speaking to reporters at the Lahore Press Club, Raja insisted that it was “a false claim that the PTI has been suppressed” or silenced, saying that critics “have a hearing problem”.