At the time of print, the results from the voting are still being counted.

Though the results are not known, some political pundits have said a significant number of races on the provincial and national assembly seats - one of the twin cities with the largest number of seats up for grabs - will reflect the larger theme in Punjab: Namely, the battle between the old guard, i.e. the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), and the new guys, the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI).

When Dawn visited polling booths in Rawalpindi, the political pundit analysis seemed to be true. The entire 11am row of women at the Saint Mary School polling booth, save four, said they would vote “balla,” “Imran,” “PTI,” or “Naya Pakistan.”

The men on the other end, at Saint Patricks School, gave a very different answer: “Sher”, “Noon”, or “Mian Sahib.”

Though this polling booth placed in NA-56 - one of four constituencies contested by PTI chairman, Imran Khan - the story seemed to repeat itself every time. Sometimes, a group of voters would shout slogans in support of Khan, and in others people would speak of the unbeatable lion of Punjab.

When a new actor enters the scene, and redefines the terms on which the game is played, statistics can be an inaccurate indication of what will take place in the future. However, it does help determine what is at stake in the present.

When it comes to the bulk of national and provincial assembly seats in Rawalpindi-Islamabad only has two national seats, NA-48 and NA-49—this area is PML-N heartland.

How twin cities voted PML-N to Islamabad again, and again

Discounting 2002 (a year where the PML-N leadership was in exile, and Gen. Pervez Musharraf and the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) was at the helm), the PML-N has won every single seat in the Rawalpindi national assembly elections since 1990 - except one in 2008 (see Figure 1).

Whenever the PML-N has won, it has done so with massive margins. The lowest margins were seen in 2008, with 30 per cent, while the highest margin is as large as 70 per cent. Last year, when Raja Pervaiz Ashraf of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) won from NA-51, he only had a lead of 11 per cent, or a little less than 9,000 votes (Figure 2).

Voter turnouts were equal to the national average - Rawalpindi saw 41 per cent of voters while Pakistan as a whole saw 44 per cent at the polls. In the run-up to the elections, analysts have said a win for the PTI would go hand in hand with a higher voter turnout. PML-N candidates have, however, had leads as high as 40,000 (PML-N stalwarts like Chaudhary Nisar Ali Khan and Mohammad Hanif Abbasi could boast of such numbers).

The results were similar on the provincial assembly level, but the competition was much tougher. The PML-N did remarkably well in 2008 and faced hardly any competition except in 2002 when it the cards seemed stacked against it.

Many have said the PPP raced ahead because of the sympathy vote it managed to collect in the aftermath of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination.

Not unexpectedly, the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) managed to claim some seats in 2002—mostly, say many, because of support from the incumbent Musharraf regime. Surprisingly, the PML-Q managed to increase the number of seats it claimed in 2002—going from 2 to 3 in 2008 (see Figure 3).

However, despite claiming a high number of seats, the PML-N faced much tougher competition. Over half of the 11 provincial seats in Rawalpindi were close marginal wins in the previous elections.

If we assume that a 15 per cent margin of win were a cut off point for a marginal seat, it is clear that five of the seven marginal seats were won by PPP and PML-Q, and in four of these, the PML-N was a close second (Figure 4).

However, the PML-N easily won with leads over thirty per cent in the remaining seats while the PPP bagged enough votes to be runner up. Analysts predict that the anti-incumbency factor might just weaken the PPP.

A major surprise could be up after this article goes to print—with the PTI expecting to cut into the PML-N vote, the latter could end up with as few seats as the PPP.

Islamabad, a different Pakistan

Capital results look very different, partially because of the very different demographic of voters that inhabit the area close to the Margalla hills.

The PML-N managed to win both its seats in 2008, but equally split them with the PPP in 2002. However, elections before 2002 did indicate that the PML-N was stronger in Islamabad.

This time around, there is much talk of the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) clinching a victory in Islamabad, via the links of Mian Aslam. Like the PTI, the JI victory is difficult to predict on the basis of the past. However, initial assessments indicate that there might be some chance for the richest candidate running in this election.

When statistics cannot predict the future

While a look at the past tells us about many of the trends that are important to look out for as election results continue to get confirmed, it is at times very difficult to rely on them as predictors of what will come.

Especially when the new players have emerged, and some of the PML-N’s former stalwarts have joined the likes of the PTI.

The 2008 boycott of several parties, including the JI and Mian Aslam, also makes it difficult to predict how the results will come in. By the time this article is printed in newspapers across the country, however, it will become all the more clear whether the twin cities will see a significant political shift of the sort only seen in Pakistan in the 1970s when the PPP came to power, or whether things will continue as before.