PTI Chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan was recovering in hospital on Friday after an assassination attempt that left him with a gunshot wound to the leg.

The attack on his convoy killed one man and wounded many others, significantly raising the stakes in political crisis gripping the country since ouster of Imran Khan's government in April.

Imran Khan "was stable and he was doing fine" at Shaukat Khanum Hospital in Lahore, his doctor Faisal Sultan told Friday morning.

The 70-year-old former international cricket star had been leading a campaign convoy of thousands since last week from Lahore to Islamabad when he was attacked.

Imran Khan escaped with at least one bullet wound to his right leg when a gunman sprayed pistol fire at his modified container truck as it slowly drove through a thick crowd in Wazirabad.

"Everyone who was standing in the very front row got hit," former information minister Fawad Chaudhry, who was standing behind Khan.