File photo of PTI Chairman Imran Khan. PHOTO INP/FILE
He further said that the people involved, including the returning officers, should be held accountable for what they have done.
Imran requested the Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry to take action immediately as "the public is demanding justice".
He also stated that if the Supreme Court had taken notice of rigging earlier, then this would not have happened.
The PTI chairman also said, “The election commission should also be held accountable. Without accountability, corruption will never cease to exist and the public is then burdened in terms of inflation.”
He also stated, “Democracy will not prevail until and unless free and fair elections are carried out. Dictators carry out such [May 11] elections.”
“How can people involved in the rigging become clean in the Assembly,” he asked.
Imran also said that if justice is not done then the PTI will protest in the streets.
He claimed that PTI was not part of the rigging in the elections, and the party will also hold free and fair by-elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP).
MQM’s stance
Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) has maintained that there is a difference between an “unverified vote” and a “fake vote”, and it was not the party’s responsibility to ensure that the ballot papers during the general elections were of good quality or that magnetic ink was used for thumb impressions.
Holding a press conference on Tuesday, MQM leader Faisal Subzwari said that votes could not be verified in other constituencies as well, but only the one where an MQM candidate won was highlighted.
“During August 22 by-polls, army personnel were present inside polling booths, and MQM still won... If NADRA does the same exercise in those constituencies, the same issue of unverified votes will come up,” he added.
Rigging in NA-256 consituency
The National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) had unearthed massive rigging in the National Assembly constituency, NA-265 (Karachi), in the May 11 elections.
According to a report submitted by the authority before an election tribunal on October 7, over 57,000 votes could not be verified in the constituency where 5,893 duplicate and 1,950 fake votes were cast.
Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s Iqbal Muhammad Ali had won the seat, defeating PTI's Muhammad Zubair Khan, who later challenged the result of 67 polling stations before the election tribunal.
According to Nadra invalid Computerised National Identity Cards were mentioned on 11,343 used counterfoils, while 791 voted were found to be out of the constituency.
COMMENTS (62)
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Mr. Imran! How successful are you in your hometown to claim a Plot in the city of Gold? What did you do to deserve this? Is this what you are going to show as your acheivement in next election? No one is happy until or unless they get a piece of Karachi Pie, right? Once you're here you won't care for your poor and left-behinds in KPK. Your home should be your base not all nice looking places. That's where you build from, that's your foundation. That's what you will show us...how you helped your hometown develope & progress to an advanced community. Don't worry about Karachi. It has been running on its own for all this time. It actually don't need any leader. As a mater of fact it's an only place which run best with least govt involvement. You probably have heard by now from police and rangers' operation....how our greedy leaders were the reason behind all chaos and killings there.
@Jimmy: @Jibran: Spot on. MQM are angels, they never rig elections, the elections rig themselves for MQM. lol.
You can see the picture of "angel" with this news item
@Jibran: Spot on. MQM are angels, they never rig elections, the elections rig themselves for MQM. lol.
it is indeed SHARAMNAK; if that would have been hapend with MQM they would have sutdown whole Karachi city.
PTIans are either unable to understand NADRA report or they are purposefully hiding the truth this report contains.IT WAS THE QUALITY OF PAPER AND NON-MAGNETIC INK THAT MADE THUMB IMPRESSIONS UNREADABLE FOR NADAR SOFTWARE. The more they bash MQM on this issue, the more committed will become MQM supporter in this constituency as all this false criticism proving to be insulting to their political choice, and this criticism too is from people outside Karachi.
Lets have a re elections in Karachi. PTI would become a second JI in this ity. Karachiites are sick of his stance on Talibaans which is basically tilted towards ethnic side
Really surprised to see comments criticizing IK although a clear-cut evidence of his rigging claims is before us now. Really, this nation deserves to be ruled by Zardaris, Altafs and Nawazs. Best of luck.
Pakistan has bigger problems to worry about than this, for example minority protection, taliban and the number of Pakistanis killed in terrorism. But o wait, Imran doesn't think its our war as yet, like the blood of 60K Pakistanis is not enough to convince him yet!
PTI came, PTI won a bit, PTI fizzled out!
My dear PTI fellows, please understand this dictum. PTI could have been a potential alternative force in Karachi but fortunately or unfortunately it sacrificed itself at at the altar of a policy only aimed at discrediting mqm rather than proposing anything tangible for karachi or other urban areas of sindh. It never spoke about the quota system, the local government system or the hundreds of other urban specific issues plaguing karachi and other urban areas of sindh. It relied largely on the vote bank of people from other provinces residing temporarily or permanently in Karachi. No wonder it failed to win the hearts and souls of the permanent denizens of the urban areas and no wonder that its lone MNA cuts a forlorn figure with no tangible position on karachi's issues. If anything the pouncing up by IK on this misleading report from Nadra is anything but pathetic proving the increasingly disillusioned state of mind of PTI's chairman.
I dare IK and his knucklehead posse of high school dropouts and sheep herd followers to pour on to the streets of just a couple of Burger localities of two major cities in Pakistan.
Folks still going gaga over this looney need a serious lobotomy of their heads.
What's the point in investigating election rigging if you don't do anything about it? Like him or not - IK has a valid point.
The returning and polling officers should be brought to justice, they are the ones who allowed this massive rigging, by sending them to jail for some years will be an example for other returning officers in the future. Less said about this ethnic party MQM, the better. Thugs will always be thugs.
The rigging was very much on the cards in Karachi. PTI could have boycotted the elections in Karachi, which in turn would have made the elections non-legitimate and unjustified. Every one in Karachi and the rest of Pakistan knows about how unfair and bogus, the elections in Karachi was held. He(I.K) seems to be a late starter, and need to put his acts together.
Now even speaking against mala fied system, rigging and demand for investigation is a crime since it has been done by Imran Khan. Nooras and Bhai log are so desperate that they cannot even see when to criticize and when appreciate.
If ever this country is ruined, it will be because of the people of Pakistan, rather than the establishment or politicians.
the problem with I.K. his superior complexity ....media projected him as a future prime minister..he lost the election...now he has become hysterical
*Do you people understand why Musharraf removed Cheap Justice * ? Or you people still with the free Judiciary ?
Well if rigged then re election should be announced by election commission.
IK was suppose to sweep Punjab now so much fuss in Khi nevertheless let some good come out of it.
Similar noise made before bye elections in NA 254 under the supervision of army where a soldier was present in every polling station and list verified by army itself: RESULT. Naeem of PTI 5000 votes yes five thousand and Rashid of MQM 52,000 votes.........eek
Though one accepts the vote bank created by PTI in Khi lets stop calling voters of other party ghosts or fraudulent.
Lets not get into good and bad, patriotic Unpatriotici, evil and angel, any Pakistani voter deserves the respect for the mandate he or she voted for.
Imran khan still immature...read the report carefully..thumb impression was ineligible so it could not be verified...nadra did not report that votes was fake...for thumb verification special inks are used which was not supplied by EC
Totally amazed to see all the negative comments in this thread. I can't believe people are bashing IK after massive rigging was unfolded by the agencies. Goes to show the state of our country, absolutely hopeless !
This guy only need power. Imran leave Karachi and fix KP Beg you plsssssssss
IK, Massive killings are also going on in Pakistan and what are you doing about it except to favor the killers? have you done anything to punish the killers? have you even demand the Federal govt to punish the killer?
Which priority list are you working from?
You demand immediate action, wow! have you ever demanded TTP to put down arms and sit and talk? not even in your own governed province, very recently TTP have again said that given an opportunity they will hit Malala again - any comments Khan sahib? Actually we should be demanding an apology from you for letting down people and their confidence.
@Tanzeel: Lol you're too funny sir!
MQM was also responsible for earth quake in 2005
The World is not fair then why is IK asking for justice in this deteriorated third world country?? What miracles will they do even if few more seats are added to their brigade?? they still cannot make two third majority or is that he wants to tell his supporters he could have performed well if granted these few more seats.
In KP, PTI won because of classical rigging. Taliban threats, bomb blasts and killings confined anti Taliban Khan voters to their homes. When Taliban Khan would stop protesting against himself.
If he was half as much concerned about terrorism as he is about poll rigging ....People would actually take him seriously.
Supreme Court of Kangaroos
Despite massive rigging efforts by JI and PTI in NA 256. MQM easily won this seat.
Imran Khan should not speak about rigging as massive irregularities exist on his PTI KPK seats according to FAFEN speaks of greater volume while NA 256 is a MQM stronghold. We'll see these voices when PS114 Nadra outcome comes. While according to the Nadra report for 256 it only says 57000 something votes couldnt be recognized due to ink issue but their CNICs were valid and are occupants of the concerned area, so flawed ink isnt voters fault frankly. Mr Khan if you wanna be leader of opposition you should play your cards well if you wanna be leader of opposition reconcile your differences with Karachi based party and play a proactive role rather then a childish hawkish role which you are playing now. As Mr Nobody of politics currently
@sashayub: No matter PTI performs or not, no matter they delivers or not. But struggle to have clean and fair elections in Pakistan is always needed. This is not a matter of PTI, this is a matter of Pakistan and Democracy and its future. For a second, ignore PTI and IK, and just focus on this issue which have been ignored for a long time.
For those who are referring to the 57,000 that could not be verified due to poor ink quality. Out of the 84,000 votes, 57,000 could not be verified, fine. But out the 27,000 that were verifiable, only 6,800 were genuine, the remaining 20,000+ were all fake, in other words, 75% votes were fake, what makes you think that the situation will be dramatically different in the 57,000 votes that were not in verifiable state? The ‘thappa mafia’ tag on MQM is proved. Reality is reality, denying it wont change it.
57 thousand is a big number. Most likely there is inherent flaw in NADRA's fingerprint identification software. The court should first order the validation of the system under varying quality of the thumb impressions.
@sashayub: ...and let MQM continue stealing peoples mandate? Had you voted in this constituency, you wudnt be saying all this...
If we accept mitti pao scheme we will face similar elections in the future and even if i accept that these are not fake votes its because of bad ink thats why machine cant read it so who is responsible for that ik ? Or election commision ? They should be brought to justice for playing with nation right by providing bad ink. We cant just say mitti pao and go on those nations who donot learn from there mistakes never succeed
The National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) had unearthed massive rigging in the National Assembly constituency, NA-265 (Karachi), in the May 11 elections
Correction, its NA-256 not NA-265. ET! Please Proof read before posting. Quality of content posted on ET site is dropping day by day.
rigging occured everywhere except kpk. . Isn't that strange??
When the truth prevail, what constraint you to accept. I am unable to realize.
I was early today surprised today to read my newspaper and then heard the news also on TV, especially that 77000 votes were caste which were bogus. the newspaper read 57000 the figure geo tez quoted was 77000. But, the figure either 57000 or 77000 does show one thing that in my country Pakistan. ' ANGELS DO CASTE VOTE" also and there are some angels, who caste more then one vote, that is 35 votes. It shows the massive rigging carried out. Right now the report has come about NA-256 but later it may turn out that other constituencies may also be there which may show these irregularities too, as major political parties like PTI, and PPP and others have been claiming. I think now a time has come that, we should move in to the new era, of voting under Bio-Metric system. If India has got it,why should we in Pakistan are not having it. Forget what ever has happened now in 2013, prepare for year 2018 and this result shows that to look for the future. May be that in 2018 we may see MORE ANGELS CASTE THE VOTE YET AGAIN.
Well done Khan Sb. first legal win of PTI and coming many more soon.
may 2013 was ro's election
Its Hysterical how our leaders are misleading the public. Calls for re-elections are totally baseless. After 56 thousand votes couldn't be read by the machine due to bad ink. They weren't declared fakes absolutely hysterical. Khan Saab Rehn Do.
Khan Sb, hope your pleadings don't go in vain. In other parts of the world, even walls have ears, but here ears and eyes have thick and impregnable walls.
“How can people involved in the rigging become clean in the Assembly,” he asked.
The same way they become clean when joining PTI.
Dearest IK, Why do not you pass a bill in National Assembly, asking for a thumb impression verification in all the constituencies of Peshawar, Karachi and Lahore within 30 days? Regards, S
IK should now forget elections rigging and concentrate more on stabilising security situation in Peshawar ! .. his party has not fastened it seat belts in KPK and yet they ask for more seats in Karachi.. i dont get this.. IK if you dont perform well where you have your grounds then how we are suppose to believe you can manage other electorial places where rigging has been done ? ! Don't cry on things that you could had potentially won rather try do your best what you already have,,, !!
From a PTI Supporter
So who is responsible for all this? Who committed all the alleged rigging or those who allowed this to happen? those who haven't done justice to their responsiblites. Or simply all those who are in a mood to neglect this important issue? I think all these are equally responsible.
Very 'Sharamnaak' act by IK to still expect justice from the judiciary and specially SC.
He is sounding more and more like a broken record.............both Imran Khan and PTI need to move on and practically do something........which is visible for voters and justifies why voters voted for PTI.........
where is supreme court now?