LAHORE: The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) lost to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) in by-elections in the National Assembly constituency NA-63 (Jhelum-II) and the Punjab Assembly’s PPP-232 (Vehari-I) on Wednesday, but after giving a run to the ruling party for its money.

In Jhelum, PTI candidate Fawad Chaudhry was outnumbered by PML-N’s Matloob Mehdi with a margin of about 5,000 votes in the unofficial results of 309 of the 314 polling stations.

The margin of win in the Vehari by-polls was narrow — 1,056 votes.

Polling started at 8pm and continued till 5pm in a largely peaceful way. Besides police, contingents of army and Rangers were deployed in the two constituencies to prevent any untoward incident.

However, independent candidate Mirza Mehboob Rabbani was allegedly tortured by PML-N activists over a trivial issue in Vehari, while Jhelum witnessed a post-polling clash resulting in bullet injuries to two activists of the PTI.

Voter turnout remained quite low in Jhelum where at one polling station (Langar) not even a single vote was cast. The number of registered voters there was 1,384.

Turnout was around 50 per cent in Vehari where PML-N’s Yousuf Kasilia and PTI’s Ayesha Nazir Jutt had a close contest.

The number of registered voters in NA-63 Jhelum was 427,757 and in PP-232 Vehari 191,092.

The Vehari seat had fallen vacant after an election tribunal unseated Mr Kasilia for submitting wrong statement of assets. During the 2013 general elections, he had won from the constituency as an independent candidate and later joined the PML-N.

His supporters danced to the beat of drum soon after the announcement of unofficial results. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s daughter Maryam Nawaz celebrated the win through her Tweet, “Dekho, dekho kaun aaya (See, who has come)”.

Ayesha Jutt alleged that PML-N activists had forcibly stopped the polling process at some stations and that election results were manipulated, otherwise she was leading with a good margin.

Also levelling allegations of pre-poll rigging, she vowed to use all options at her disposal for fighting against the “rigging”.

The Jhelum seat had fallen vacant after the death of PML-N’s Raja Iqbal Mehdi. For the by-election, his son Matloob Mehdi had been fielded by the party. He was challenged by PTI’s Fawad Hussain, a TV anchor who launched his political career from the platform of the PML-Q, then joined the Musharraf-led All Pakistan Muslim League but later defected to the PPP.

Mr Hussain also alleged that rigging had taken place at a couple of polling stations. He claimed that security forces had caught a presiding officer “illegally” carrying seals which should have been placed in the corner covered with screens to ensure privacy to the voters.

Published in Dawn, September 1st, 2016