By-elections on 35 national, provincial assemblies' seats today

ISLAMABAD: By-elections in 35 constituencies of national and provincial assemblies will be held on Sunday.

Three hundred and seventy candidates are in the run for the elections to be held on eleven national assembly and twenty four provincial assemblies’ seats.

Polling will begin at 8:00 pm in the morning and continue till 5:00 pm without any break.

The election commission of Pakistan has completed all the arrangements for the smooth conduct of the polls.

Ballot papers have been handed over to the presiding officers, which will be distributed under the supervision of the Pakistan Army.

Over 7,400 polling stations have been set up for the by polls. Of these, 1727 have been categorised as highly sensitive.

Read More: 9.9m ballot papers printed for by-elections

According to the ECP officials, 848 out of total 5,193 polling stations in Punjab, 544 of total 1555 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 201 of total 544 in Sindh and 134 of total 197 in Balochistan have been categorized as ‘highly sensitive’

The proportion of most sensitive polling stations is highest in Balochistan (68.02 per cent), followed by KP (34.98pc), Sindh (20.20pc) and Punjab (16.32pc).

Security cameras had been installed at all the sensitive polling stations, which would be guarded by army troops, officials said. The deployment of army troops was started on Friday and they would remain deployed there till Oct 15, officials said.

The in-charges of army personnel deployed at the polling stations will enjoy the powers of a magistrate first class during the entire period of their deployment and will be empowered to summarily try those found involved in impersonation, capturing of polling stations or violation of other relevant provisions of the law.

District returning officers and returning officers for the by-elections have also been given powers of magistrate first class.

Total 11 National Assembly’s constituencies, for which by-polls will be held, nine are in Punjab and one each in Sindh and KP.

Two Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s candidates have already been elected unopposed from Punjab Assembly’s constituencies PP-87 (Mianwali) and PP-296 (Rajanpur), by-polls will now be held for 24 provincial constituencies, 11 in Punjab, two in Sindh, nine in KP and two in Balochistan.

Most of these seats had been vacated by those who were elected on more than one seat in the July 25 general elections. Among them was also Prime Minister Imran Khan who won elections from all the five NA constituencies he contested.

ECP establishes control room for guidance of

Overseas Pakistanis

Overseas Pakistanis will vote for the first time in the by-polls.

The Election Commission of Pakistan has established a control room for guidance of Overseas Pakistanis in by-elections.

In a statement on Saturday, the ECP advised those overseas Pakistanis, who have not yet received voting password, to contact the control room at 0092512778899.

It said that voters would not be allowed to cast their votes without password.