It was found that extra votes had been cast by people. PHOTO: AFP/FILE
KARACHI: A report regarding thumb print verification of votes cast at NA-258 released by the National Database Registration Authority (NADRA) revealed that only 2, 400 of the total votes cast in the NA-258 constituency, Karachi, were genuine.
NADRA submitted the report to Justice Sherwani of the election tribunal, and confirmed that the thumb prints on thousands of votes could not be verified.
PML-N’s candidate Abdul Hakim Baloch had won in this area with a total of 51,148 votes cast for him.
His victory was challenged by the Pakistan Peoples Party candidate Abdur Razzaq Raja.
Following orders from the Election Tribunal, NADRA conducted thumb print verifications of 32, 695 votes cast in 33 polling stations, to find out that only 2, 475 of the votes were legitimate.
The report also said that t least 1, 400 of the voters had cast their votes twice.
Previously, during the May 11 elections police and rangers were called in to control voters who were trying to barge into a polling station of NA-258 constituency in Gulshan-e-Hadeed area of Karachi.
The turnout of voters in NA-258 during the last two elections has been over 40 per cent – 41.3% in 2002 and 41.04 in 2008. The constituency has 392,994 registered voters, out of which 232,247 are male and 160,747 are female.
COMMENTS (33)
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PTI is demanding verification in those seats which they have loose imran khan being as sport man he should offer his winning seat for nadara verifacation.
PTI is demanding verification in those seats which they have loose imran khan being as sport man he should offer his winning seat for nadara verifacation.
@tariq: Bismillah karain Sir KPK say. No problem at all. Since PTI won from KPK the Opposition party has to file Rigging case in ECP. I am waiting for the opposition parties (may it be ANP, PMLN. JUIF or even MQM) to file a petition against KPK seats for Thumb verification. I hope they file the case within a week, or a month or maybe more? I am just waiting. You can also encourage the opposition to file a case. However, 60 applications for Thumb impression verification has been submitted to ECP by PTI but no reaction. Only silence from ECP or rejection from ECP. Please give us justice.
@Lawyer: Yes,We are ready on thumb verification of complete karachi seats.You need to know how MQM is popular in Karachi with more than 85% mendate.Let's begin from KPK.33 seats in NA and still dhandli.
@ali ahmed: Why not. Thumb impression recounting of NA-250 and all KPK seats should be done. But after that sir, would you please also allow Thumb verification of complete Karachi seats and Punjab seats? I doubt that coz then the real mandate of the people might come to light and it will be very hard for the feudal parties to accept that mandate.
verification of NA250 should also be done
Even if die hard PML-N supporters want to believe that the elections were free and fair most of us know they were not. This verfication result only confirms what we already knew but it should not end here. Every person with a multiple vote, and every person casting a fake vote should be punished and it should be further investigated how they managed to do it. So catch all the officials involved as well. The only way rigging can be reduced is by getting your checks and balances working efficiently and penalising people who are involved.
How Blind people are in Criticizing when It comes to MQM, and Believe me it hurts when a common voters of MQM see the sick biased from rest of the country. Just simple word "Shame" is enough for Commentator like Ibrahim, who don't have any clue about NA 258, like 100% other non Karachites, who like to Impose their point of view on us.
@Sexton Blake: Your assertion is as far from the truth as Pakistan is from the USA. Please do not spread false information. While there are some abuses in the system, as could be expected wherever human beings are involved, voting fraud in the USA is not at all common and is severely punished if detected.
The elections were free and fair they said. PTI should show sportsmanship they said.
PML-N is the real enemy of Pakistan!
At least the Pakistani people can be a little relieved that NADRA have gone to the trouble of determining that there was faulty voting. In countries such as the USA, who use Diebold voting machines, the result can be anything the fraudsters want it to be and to my knowledge nobody is allowed to question the result. In other words, vote rigging is routine in the USA, and is just accepted.
@Ibrahim: Stupid it is PML(N) candidate thuppa votes. Same thing has been done in one more of there candidate at kemmari and mehmoodabad. Yes MQM also does that but this is nooraa league thuppaa voting on 11th May we karachites seen.
pml N real face is exposed . they are masters of rigging
NADRA can give names and adress of all those who voted more than once like Mr Saleh and ECP/courts should punish them with long jail term to set examples for future riggers
@Javed Afridi: NADRA verified the thumb impressions of only 46 polling stations out of 287.
There should be a re-election for NA-258.by fair and Transparently ...
@ Javed This is the result of thumb verification of 18 out of more than 300 polling stations, if thumb verification conducted on all the polling station of this constituency, multiply the average of these fake votes to the total polling stations and it way more than 16000, the difference between the winner and the real winner.
They should also tell us to which political party did the majority of the votes go in those polling stations which had large number of fake votes.
@Javed Afridi.. According to the report in THENEWS, a point not mentioned in this ET report NADRA verified the thumb impressions of 46 polling stations out of 287.. So perhaps the issue is far from being resolved and maybe the fake votes did play a big role in the final result. Anyways atleast the people polling fake votes should be punished to teach them a lesson for the future
@Ibrahim: BTW this seat is wone by PMLn , why bring MQM
"PML-N’s candidate Abdul Hakim Baloch had won in this area with a total of 51,148 votes cast for him"
Still wanna blame MQM for rigging. BE MY GUEST
@Fahat Hayat.... no body can stop you from dreaming...many method used to finish the major party so many operation taken so many fake party was created even judiciary got involved ...but still major party surviving......
NADRA verified the thumb impressions of 46 polling stations out of 287. I dont know why ET has not mentioned this very important fact because it tells you of the actual magnitude of rigging which is much higher than these figures suggest!
Right is right and wrong is wrong.
There should be a re-election for NA-258.
Based on evidence, the ECP should declared the earlier result of this very constituency as null and void and cancel the notification of the winner.
The election in NA-258 should be held in a transparent manner and it should be looked after by Pakistan Army and Rangers.
NADRA should verify thumb prints in other constituencies as well.
@Hasan: This proves an over all situation that happened through out Karachi and not just this one Polling station. The only reason people are quiet and don't care is because people already knew this because it happened infront of them specially on the polling stations where the "Major Party" of Karachi won. If things will keep up this way, the Major Party of this city will have some more problems coming there way soon.
MQM once again stands exposed!!! If four more constituencies are made liable to thumb impressions, you will see more startling facts unfolding.
If this constituency had been won by the majority party of Karachi, we would have seen this comments section filled with condemnation of the party. But since it was PML-N who won, people are pretty quite out here.
We are shocked to hear this. Is it possible that Saleh was casting 8 votes for his entire family??? After all, it is not unusual for us to have 8 members in the family. Also, voting is a good thing; more the better.