ISLAMABAD: The Election Commis­sion of Pakistan (ECP) on Thursday notified the victory of PTI Chairman Imran Khan from seven National Assembly constituencies in by-polls held in October, taking a lenient view of his delay in submitting election expense details.

The notification — earlier withheld after Mr Khan failed to submit the details of by-poll expenses within the stipulated time — was issued hours after the commission announced a reserved verdict condoning the delay.

The decision comes at a time when the PTI chief is planning to break his own record by contesting by-polls on all 33 National Assembly seats that fell vacant after Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf accepted long-pending resignations of party lawmakers, apparently to derail PTI’s return to the house.

Under the law, contesting candidates should submit details of election expenses to the ECP within 10 days after the polling day, and a failure may lead to disqualification. The ECP, however, is empowered to condone the delay.

A three-member ECP panel headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja, while announcing the decision reserved on Dec 20 noted that contesting an election was a fundamental right in terms of Article 17(2) of the Constitution and court judgements.

Notification earlier withheld after PTI chief failed to submit by-poll expense details in time

Referring to Article 223(2) of the Constitution, the ECP order also pointed out that Mr Khan would have to resign from all but one seat within a month after the declaration of the result.

The by-polls were held on nine seats after the National Assembly speaker, like he did earlier this week, accepted resignations of some of the PTI lawmakers who resigned en masse in April after Mr Khan was deposed as prime minister through a confidence vote in parliament.

Mr Khan then ran for eight of those vacant seats and emerged victorious on seven of them after losing one seat to PPP’s Abdul Hakeem Baloch in Karachi’s Malir.

The seven constituencies bagged by the PTI chief were NA-22 (Mardan), NA-24 (Charsadda), NA-31 (Peshawar), NA-108 (Faisalabad), NA-118 (Nankana Sahib), NA-239 (Korangi), and NA-45 (Kurram).

The ninth seat — NA-157 (Multan) — was contested by PTI’s Meher Bano Qureshi, daughter of party leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi. However, she was defeated by PPP’s Ali Musa Gilani, son of former premier Yousaf Raza Gilani.

In the last ECP hearing, Mr Khan’s counsel Ali Gohar informed the commission that the respondent had submitted the details along with vouchers.

He also argued that the delay in filing of return of election expenses was not intentional, as the respondent got busy with party affairs and was bedridden due to injuries he received in an armed attack during a party’s long march.

He had pleaded for condoning the delay.

ECP Special Secretary Zafar Iqbal Hussain said that the respondent had not submitted his return of election expenses within the stipulated time without any sufficient cause.

He also elaborated on Section 98 of the Elections Act, 2017, under which the returned candidates are bound to submit the return of election expenses within 10 days of the polling date.

He said there was no reason for the delay and objected that the respondent had not submitted the applications by himself for the condonation of delay.

Therefore, the notification as a returned candidate might not be issued until the final disposal of the case and a complaint under Section 137 of the Elections Act might be filed against the respondent.

The ECP’s additional director general (Law) stated that the commission had the power to disqualify a candidate under Section 232 of the Elections Act if he or she violated Section 137 of the act.

Published in Dawn, January 20th, 2023