A paltry three overseas Pakistanis registered their i-votes for the upcoming by-elections in Lahore's PP-168 constituency — much to the dismay of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and National Database and Registration Authority's (Nadra) officials.

As the deadline for the internet voting (i-voting) registration lapsed, only a trio of the total 4,667 overseas Pakistanis from the PP-168 constituency registered their votes, DawnNewsTV reported.

The PP-168 constituency has voters based in 10 countries and is set to be a part of the second experiment of the facility.

The first experiment of the i-voting service was conducted during the October 14 by-elections, and while the exercise had been conducted smoothly, it had drawn a tepid response from overseas Pakistanis.

Of the 632,000 overseas Pakistanis eligible to vote then, only 7,419 — a little over 1pc — had registered to cast their ballot.