Fake Letter Claiming Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif Hospitalised Goes Viral
This is a fake letter, no official announcement has been made regarding this.
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A letter claiming Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was recently hospitalised is going viral on social media.
The viral letter reads Sharif was undergoing treatment for hemorrhoids at the Army Hospital, Rawalpindi. It further states that his condition remains stable and is signed by Asad Rehman Gilani, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister.
Who shared this?: Several social media user along with some media outlets shared about this letter. Outlets including Times Now, Republic TV, News24 Hindi, and News18 Bangla carried the letter and some of them also stated that this news is not confirmed.
What's the truth?: This is a fake letter.
We did not find Asad Rehman Gilani serving as the current principal secretary to the Prime Minister after he was transferred in March.
How did we find out the truth?: We performed a relevant keyword search on Google which did not bring up any credible Indian or Pakistani report.
We also checked Pakistan's PMO official X (formerly Twitter) account as well as their official website but did not find any such letter or announcement.
PMO account is also sharing latest updates on Sharif meeting with Ambassador of Kuwait to Pakistan, which proves that he is not hospitalised.
Next, we performed a keyword search on Google to find out more about Asad Rehman Gilani, named as principal secretary to the PMO in the viral letter.
However, we found out a report shared by Dawn on 18 March which mentioned that Gilani was removed from this post on 17 March.
It further mentioned that he was transferred to the National Heritage and Culture Division as secretary and the post of the Prinicipal Secretary to the PM has since been abolished.
It adds that Pakistan PM Sharif's newly appointed adviser, Dr Tauqir Shah, will serve in that capacity instead.
This report was shared on 18 March 2025.
(Source: Dawn/Screenshot)
On the same Pakistani news website, Dawn, we found a report from 29 April 2025, which quoted a source at the Pakistan PMO and dismissed the claim.
The report quoting the source, also called this viral letter 'fake'.
(Source: Dawn/Screenshot)
We reached out to Lubna Jerar Naqvi, a fact-checker and a journalist from Pakistan who clarified that this is a fake letter.
Naqvi shared a story with us which quotes M Arshad Munir, the additional secretary for media at the PMO, who also confirmed the letter is fake.
Conclusion: A fake letter is being shared online to claim that Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was recently hospitalised for piles.
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