Tough contest expected: By-election on NA-193 Rajanpur today

ISLAMABAD: All eyes are on Rajanpur district in south Punjab today (Sunday) where a tough contest is expected between Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) in the by-poll for National Assembly’s seat NA-193 – after the electoral entity, Sunday, rejected the provincial caretaker government’s request to postpone this election over security concerns.

As many as 11 candidates are in the run for the NA-193 seat which has 379,204 registered voters comprising of 206,495 male and 172,204 female voters, according to the data issued by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

The constituency has 237 polling stations, of which, 68 are marked as highly sensitive and all the remaining 169 have been marked as sensitive, the ECP data suggests.

Of the 237 polling stations, as many as 80 polling stations are set up for male voters, 77 for female voters, and the remaining 80 polling stations are combined (where both male and female voters can cast vote,) according to the data.

On Friday, Punjab’s caretaker government approached the ECP with a written request to postpone the by-election citing security concerns.

Earlier, Commissioner Dera Ghazi Khan Division Khalid Manzoor mentioned the security concerns in his letter to the caretaker provincial government.

But, the ECP, Saturday, dismissed these concerns on the grounds that adequate security measures were being taken by the Punjab Police and Rangers for the provision of security at all the polling stations.

Although nearly a dozen candidates are in run for NA-193 seat, the real contest appears to be between PTI’s Mohsin Leghari and PML-N’s Ammar Awais Leghari.

This seat fell vacant following the death of PTI’s Jaffar Khan Leghari in December last year.

Mohsin Leghari is the nephew of the late Jaffar Leghari. He is also regarded as the political successor of the late Leghari who was reportedly the most respected elder of the Leghari tribe. Mohsin served as the Finance Minister in the former coalition government of PTI and Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML-Q) in Punjab. He was elected to Punjab Assembly on a PTI ticket from PP-293 Rajanpur in the 2018 general polls.

Ammar Awais Leghari is PML-N’s candidate for NA-193. He is the grandson of the former president of Pakistan Farooq Leghari, the late chief of the Leghari tribe, and son of Awais Leghari from PML-N who remained a federal minister in 2017-18 in the then federal government of PML-N. Awais was then elected to Punjab Assembly’s seat PP-292 Dera Ghazi Khan in the 2018 general elections.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023