The voting picked up after midday in the constituencies largely comprising urban areas, while in the city’s suburban areas people voted in large numbers in the morning. The most willing voters as ever were those who were ferried to the polling stations by the candidates.

Women voted in large numbers in many Lahore constituencies, such as NA-124, 125, 126 and PP-149 to 154 to push the turnout up. According to estimates, the turnout was about 45 per cent in these constituencies. Elsewhere – in NA-118 and 12 — not many women turned up at the voting booths.

By 11am, only six votes had been cast at the women polling station NO 284-136, Islamia College Railway Road. The college is situated in Gowalmandi which is historically a politically vibrant locality. The total number of voters was 698 and the polling had started at 8am.

Similarly, only 14 votes had been cast at another polling station in the same college by 11.15pm, and the presiding officer Abida Siddique, a teacher, said the staff had been sitting idle since morning.

The reason for the low turnout was stated to be the fear created due to the murder of a PML-N worker not far from the college the night before the election. “The murder has intimidated voters,” a woman said.

Nosheen Iftikhar, polling agent of PML-N’s Salman Rafique, said people were afraid of terrorism and that was why they were disinterested in casting their votes. “My family was not allowing me to perform the duty for the same reason,” she added.

PPP candidate Zamir Khokher’s polling agent Rubina Shaheen also attributed the low turnout to the murder of the PML-N worker in the area.

Both the polling agents had no issues with police or the polling staff, nor with their counterparts belonging to the PML-Q.

Five polling stations for women were established in a hall of the college, exposing the polling booths to public view. Two polling booths were noticeably placed in the middle of the hall from where voters could easily be seen casting their votes. The presiding officer, however, assured Dawn no irrelevant person was allowed to go near the booths.

Polling at City Muslim League High School, Bazaar Said Mitha, was peaceful, even though the place has a history of disturbances during voting, even in its women booths. The election staff was relaxed and pleased over the smooth polling on Monday.

PS No 158/10 Presiding Officer Tauheed Hina said the only problem the staff faced during the day was that in many cases the identity card numbers of aspiring voters were missing from the electoral list. These people were not allowed to vote.

PML-N’s Salman Rafique’s polling agent Rashida Muhammad Akram said the missing identity card numbers were affecting the voters of her party and those of the PPP. Many a voter could not reach the relevant polling stations because of faulty polling plan, she said.

She also showed the polling list in which the name of a voter, Hina Muzaffar, was mentioned five times.

At an adjacent polling station for women only 446 of the total 1,396 votes were cast by the closing hour.

In Shahdara PPP candidate for NA-118, Syed Asif Hashmi, and for PP-137 Samiullah Khan complained of discrepancies in the list given to them and the one available with the polling staff.

“Many of our supporters could not cast their votes because their names were missing in the lists,” Samiullah Khan said, adding he faced great difficulty in evicting the husband of the presiding officer at a school at Muhammadi Chowk.

In Karim Park, PPP’s candidate for PP-139 Chaudhry Muhammad Asghar alleged the polling staff was delaying voting at polling stations which were attracting larger number of his voters. He too complained of flaws in voters’ lists, and said this was depriving him of potential votes.

In Township (NA-127), Tasleem Akhtar said she had visited many polling stations but could not find her and her daughters’ votes. “This poll is a sheer wastage of money and time,” she irately said.

In many cases, people did not know about their polling booths. At polling station No 104, Government Primary School, Katchi Kothi, Raiwind Road, the polling staff said a number of voters, who used to poll their votes at Khambey Village, had been registered at this polling station. “Many voters are turning up after checking their votes in Khambey Village,” they said.

Interestingly, in NA-123, a UC-18 councillor, Nazim Husain, was also seen struggling to locate his name in the voters’ list.

Most conspicuous were young voters - both boys and girls. They said the electronic media had made them realise the importance of their vote, and they were the ones dragging their parents out for voting. “Parents have traditionally ignored the power of their vote. But young generation knows that only voting could change the fate of this country and they would make sure that vote power is asserted with its full might,” said one of the young voters from Gulberg.

The presiding officers at many polling stations in Lahore said they were seriously short-staffed which explained long queues at some places.

Presiding Officer Muhammad Yousaf at Government Primary School, Rakh Rai, said two women polling staff members did not turn up, forcing him to fill their places on an emergency basis.

Presiding Officer Aqeela Yousaf said she had to arrange two girls from the nearby village to start polling at the Government Girls Community Model School at Dyal village. “The headmistress was unaware that a polling station had been set up at the school. We approached her at her Wagha residence, showed her the Election Commission’s letter and only then she asked the watchman to hand over the campus to us,” said the presiding officer.

A number of polling staff said they were assigned duties at three different polling stations and they chose one of it themselves. This led to confusion. Some of the staff members who did report to one RO were reported missing by another.

A number of voters, who reached a polling station at Government High School, Township, (NA-127), were shocked to know that their votes had already been cast through, they were told, postal ballots.

The joke was repeated in many other areas. Jamal Din, a security guard at a private college, told Dawn that he had come to cast his vote after office hours but the polling staff told him that his vote had already been polled. “I am angry that someone has snatched the right of vote from me,” he said.

The PML-N got help from the internet in tracing the missing voters from Election Commission’s website by placing computers close to some of its election camps, with moderate success.

A couple of women were ‘caught’ striking ‘deal’ with voters for casting of ballots in favour of PML-Q candidates at the Muslim League Boys High School polling station close to the Railways headquarters on the Empress Road.

The women ‘dealers’ were removed when some voters complained at the election camp of the PPP.

However, another ‘dealer’ group emerged after an hour and started arguing with the police who, obviously fearing protest by the PPP and the PML-N, ordered them to leave the area.

The political parties failed to discharge their traditional ‘duty’: providing the voters with slips containing details such as vote number and polling station concerned a couple of days in advance.

Also, polling at some places started around an hour late for no polling agent of any candidate could reach there in time. These included polling stations at Government Girls High School, Sodiwal; Girls High School, Multan Road; Junior Model High School, Multan Road; and Iqra Model Schools on New Shalimar and Kaliar Roads where polling began at 9.15am.