Thanks to artificial intelligence, former Prime Minister Imran Khan was able to campaign from behind bars with a voice clone delivering impassioned speeches on his behalf during virtual PTI rallies.
Imran has been in prison since August. He is on trial for leaking classified documents, but claims the charges were trumped up to prevent him from running in the general election scheduled for February 8.
But PTI used artificial intelligence to craft a four-minute message from a 71-year-old man to headline a “virtual rally” hosted overnight on social media from Sunday to Monday despite internet disruptions. I attached it.
PTI said Imran sent a shorthand manuscript embodying his rhetorical terms through his lawyer.
The text was then dubbed into speech using a tool from Eleven Labs, an AI company that boasts the ability to create “voice clones” from existing audio samples.
“Dear Pakistanis, I would like to first commend the social media team for this historic endeavor,” said a voice imitating Imran.
“You're probably wondering how I'm doing in prison,” the formal voice added. “Today, my commitment to true freedom is very strong.
“Our party is not allowed to hold public rallies,” Imran said in the video, calling on his supporters to gather in large numbers during the general election period. “Our citizens are being kidnapped and their families being harassed,” he said.
The audio was broadcast at the end of a five-hour livestream of the speech by PTI supporters on Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) and YouTube, overlaying historical footage and still images of the former prime minister.
According to PTI, the show featured genuine video clips from the former cricketer's previous speeches inserted at the end, with occasional captions indicating that it was “Imran Khan's AI voice based on notes”. displayed.
“This made sense for us now that we can no longer physically meet Imran Khan at political rallies,” said Gibran Ilyas, the US-based head of PTI social media. “It was about overcoming oppression.”
PTI was the first political party in the country to widely exploit the potential of social media, using the app to target a younger audience when it came to power five years ago.
“We wanted to get into election mode,” Ilyas said. AFP. “PTI's political rally is incomplete without Imran Khan.”
Global network monitoring firm NetBlocks said social media was restricted for seven hours starting late Sunday due to an incident “consistent with past instances of internet censorship” targeting the PTI chief.
Pakistan Telecommunications Authority said the outage was under investigation, but internet access appeared to be generally normal.
Interim Information Minister Murtaza Solangi said inquiries about internet outages could be referred to the communications regulator or the Information Ministry, adding: “We do not have any information on that.”
But he did not answer whether this was a violation of the freedoms of speech and assembly required by election law for a free and fair vote, and in this case it could be pre-voting fraud. be.
Nevertheless, the virtual rally was viewed by more than 4.5 million people across Facebook, X, and YouTube.
“It wasn't very convincing,” said Syed Muhammad Ashar, 38, a business manager in the eastern city of Lahore.
“The grammar was weird too. But I'll give them points for the effort,” he said. “Frankly, there is no substitute for real rallies and real speeches,” he added.
However, media official Hussain Javed Afroz praised the digitally streamed speech.
“No other political party uses technology as much as PTI,” the 42-year-old said. “These are new tools, so I think it’s a positive thing to use,” he said.
