Peaceful polling held for AJK refugee seats

KARACHI:

Polling for two Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) refugee seats concluded peacefully in Karachi on Sunday, with voter turnout picking up after a slow start earlier in the day.

The vote was held for LA-34 Jammu-I and LA-40 Kashmir Valley-I constituencies, with polling continuing uninterrupted from 8am to 5pm across the city's seven districts.

A total of 34 polling stations were set up in Karachi, where morning turnout remained thin but increased by afternoon, particularly with the participation of women voters. No untoward inci-dent was reported, as authorities maintained strict security arrangements throughout the day.

Political parties also established camps outside polling stations to facilitate voters.

In LA-34 Jammu-I, 17 candidates were in the fray, including Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz's Nasir Hussain Dar, Pakistan Peoples Party's Chaudhry Abdul Qadeer Chohan, Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party's Bilal Mukhtar Butt, Jamaat-e-Islami's Raja Muhammad Sohail, and All Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Conference's Muhammad Saud Mukhtar, along with 12 independent can-didates.

The constituency has 19,008 registered voters - 10,315 men and 8,693 women - spread across 51 districts of Sindh, Punjab and Balochistan, including 698 voters from Karachi. For the seat, 131 polling stations and 225 polling booths were established nationwide.

Meanwhile, 11 candidates contested LA-40 Kashmir Valley-I, including PML-N's Muhammad Naeem Khan, PPP's Aamir Abdul Ghaffar, Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party's Muhammad Saleem Butt, Jamaat-e-Islami's Sohrab Butt, MQM's Saima Fareed, Jammu Kashmir Liberation League's Mu-hammad Aslam Malik and Jammu Kashmir United Movement's Muhammad Bashir Khan, in ad-dition to four independent candidates.

The constituency has 4,897 registered voters - 2,401 men and 2,496 women.

A total of 47 polling stations and 85 polling booths were set up, including 20 polling stations in Karachi, which accounts for around 4,200 voters in the constituency.

Kashmiri refugees from other districts of Sindh and Balochistan also participated in the polling process.