ISLAMABAD, May 15: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has decided to hear on Friday a plea for re-polling in the entire NA 250 (Karachi) constituency and issued notices to Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf chief Imran Khan and Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s deputy convener Dr Farooq Sattar.

The commission met here on Wednesday and took up 53 cases on the cause list. Chief Election Commissioner Fakhruddin G. Ebrahim did not attend the hearing.

When a petition filed by Advocate Maulvi Iqbal Haider, himself a candidate, seeking re-polling in the NA 250 constituency came up for hearing, the commission, according to sources, pointed out that a similar plea had been made by Dr Sattar in an application sent to the CEC.

The ECP expressed its desire to hear the parties before taking a decision on the issue and issued notices to the Sindh chief secretary, the PTI chief and the MQM leader.

It will decide on Friday whether to uphold its earlier decision to hold re-polling at 43 polling stations of NA 250 or in the entire constituency.

Mr Haider said voting at almost all the polling stations of the constituency had begun three hours after the time fixed by the commission. Besides, he said polling stations had been captured by activists of political parties and ballot boxes taken away. He claimed that Sindh High Court Chief Justice Musheer Alam also could not cast his vote.

The sources said the commission also ordered recount of the votes in NA 57 (Attock) on an application filed by Malik Amin Aslam of the PPP. The recount will take place at the office of the district returning officer at 8am on Thursday. According to unofficial results, Sheikh Aftab Ahmad of the PML-N had won the seat, securing 59,638 votes, while Malik Aslam had bagged 55,515 votes.

The commission ordered re-polling at 34 polling stations of three constituencies of the National Assembly and two of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly.

The re-polling at two polling stations of NA 269 (Khuzdar), four of NA 41 (Fata), four of PK 71 (Bannu) and three of PK 72 (Bannu) will be held on May 21. Re-polling at 21 polling stations of NA 46 (Fata) will be held on May 25.

Talking to reporters after the ECP hearing, Mir Baz Khan Khetran of the PPP, who had lost to JUI-F candidate Maulana Ameer Zaman, alleged that hundreds of ballots papers had been stamped by one person in his constituency. He said that at a polling station where only 71 votes had been cast when polling closed, the result showed over 900 votes. He said the location of seven polling stations had been changed at the eleventh hour to up to 17km away.

He said the thumb impressions of the voters in his constituency should be verified through Nadra’s database. He also offered to bear expenses of the exercise.

Malik Nasir Khan from PK 73 and Pakhtun Yar from PK 70 said they had brought with them concrete evidence of rigging. They showed reporters ballot papers with stamps on the election symbol of book and fake identity cards.