ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has constituted 38 teams to verify all crucial forms of the Feb 8 elections uploaded on its official website.

According to the terms of reference spelt out in an office order issued with the approval of Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja, a copy of which is available with Dawn, the teams will verify that all Forms-45 and Forms-46 are uploaded as per final list of polling stations.

The teams will identify missing Form-45 and Form-46 and prepare their details on the prescribed form to be provided by the Elec­tions Wing. The teams will also identify unreadable forms, and verify that Forms-47, 48 and 49 of all constituencies are uploaded.

The teams have been asked to complete the task within seven days positively.

Teams asked to identify missing forms, complete task in a week

The secretly issued order, which has neither been placed on the ECP’s website nor officially shared with the media, does not mention the reasons which compelled the commission to undertake the exercise.

The move, however, comes around two months after the disclosure that the ECP had ‘modified’ the results of at least 41 constituencies of national and provincial assemblies in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtun­khwa on two separate dates in the first week of July by updating Forms-45 stored on its official Google Drive.

Although it was not clear what modifications had been made to the documents, the move had raised questions on the transparency of the electoral process.

The data available on the ECP’s Google Drive — which it has used to upload information pertaining to the 2024 general elections — on July 3 showed that Forms-45 of 14 provincial assembly constituencies in Lahore were missing. In their place, Forms-46 had been uploaded to fill the void.

An examination of the ECP’s Google Drive on July 3 also showed that around 50 Forms-45 were missing for the NA-125 constituency in Lahore. But this started to change from the very next day.

On July 4 and 5 — according to the modification date visible on Google Drive — the ECP added the remaining forms for NA-125, as well as 14 other provincial assembly constituencies in Lahore. These included PP-146, PP-148, PP-150, PP-151, PP-154, PP-156, PP-159, PP-160, PP-162, PP-164, PP-166, PP-170, PP-172, and PP-173.

Besides Punjab Chief Minister Maryan Nawaz’s constituency PP-159, these seats also included PP-164 (Lahore), the seat vacated by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, and PP-150 which was bagged by Aleem Khan of Istehkam-i-Pakistan Party. Besides these Lahore constituencies, the ECP also modified folders of another 26 constituencies of national and provincial assemblies in Punjab and KP, where Forms-45 had already been uploaded.

In Punjab, the 10 constituencies included NA-99, NA-101, NA-103, and NA-104 (Faisalabad). The two Lahore seats where data was purportedly modified included NA-118, where Hamza Shehbaz emerged victorious against PTI’s Aliya Hamza Malik, and NA-121, where PML-N’s Rohail Asghar lost to an independent nominee, Wasim Qadir.

Similarly, two constituencies from Okara — NA-136 and NA-138 — and one seat each from Layyah and Taunsa also witnessed some updates. Likewise, there were eight provincial assembly seats where the data seemed to have been modified as well. These seats include PP-22 (Chakwal), PP-23 (Talagang), PP-108 (Faisalabad), PP-186 and 187 (Okara), PP-197 (Pakpattan), and PP-213 (Multan).

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the ECP purportedly updated the data in eight constituencies of national and provincial assemblies, including NA-2, NA-3, NA-35, PK-5, PK-7, PK-8, PK-9 and PK-10, all won by PTI-backed candidates.

Published in Dawn, September 6th, 2024