Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday rejected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Usman Dar’s plea demanding vote recount in NA-73 Sialkot.
While announcing the decision, the court upheld Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Khawaja Asif’s victory in the constituency. Earlier, LHC had restrained the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) from issuing the victory notification of former foreign minister Khawaja Asif in NA-73 Sialkot constituency.
Dar, in his petition submitted through Advocate Anees Hashmi and Advocate Tajamul Gondal, had challenged the victory of Asif, pleading that the returning officer did not provide Form-45 to the polling agents.
The PTI leader maintained that as many as 7,346 votes were dismissed in his constituency and he lost to the PML-N leader by a margin of 1,406 votes.
In the election held on July 25, Khawaja Asif was declared victorious with 116,957 votes, against PTI’s Usman Dar who secured 115,464 votes in the constituency. On Monday, LHC had ordered the ECP to withhold Khawaja Asif’s and Rana Sanaullah’s victory notifications. Justice Mamoonul Rasheed gave the directives after hearing petitions by Dar and Nisar Ahmed Nisar against the two PML-N leaders.
Published in Daily Times, August 9th 2018.
