The election tribunal of the Balochistan High Court on Friday ordered a re-election in the NA-265 constituency (Quetta-II) after declaring the election held there as null and void, a private TV channel reported.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Qasim Khan Suri had been elected from the area back in 2018. Suri was later elected to hold the position of the deputy speaker of the National Assembly.
The election win of Suri had earlier been challenged by Balochistan National Party leader Nawabzada Lashkari Raisani. The latter alleged that Suri had won the election by rigging the polls.
After hearing the arguments to both sides of the case, the high court had reserved a decision in this regard earlier this month. The verdict was announced by Justice Abdullah Baloch on Friday.
The tribunal, however, did not announce a date for the re-election.
Over the course of the case’s proceedings, the tribunal had also directed the National Database and Registration Authority to submit biometric verification of voters that were registered in the constituency. The BNP candidate, in his petition, had contended that of a total of 114,000 votes cast during the polls in NA-265, 65,000 votes were invalid. He had argued that the election had been rigged since a sizeable number of votes could not be verified.
According to the results announced by the ECP, Suri had received 25,979 votes while Raisani had received 20,394 votes. According to the ECP’s official results, 3,422 votes in total had been rejected in the constituency. Addressing the media after the verdict was announced, BNP chief Akhtar Mengal said the tribunal’s decision is a victory of BNP as well as all democratic forces. “Our doubts regarding rigging in elections have proven to be true,” Mengal said. “The confidence of people, who hope for justice, has increased by this decision. [We] hope that those who protested against election rigging after 2013 polls will accept this decision,” he said, and expressed hope that “the Supreme Court [will] order a reelection in this constituency soon following this verdict”.
