ISLAMABAD: The returning officer (RO) has turned down PTI candidate’s plea for recounting in PP-7 constituency of Rawalpindi.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had challenged voting results the result with the RO of the related constituency as the final results were announced around 2am with a delay of many hours.
In the PP-7 constituency, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) candidate Raja Sagheer Ahmad won with 68,906 votes while PTI candidate Col (retd) Shabir Awan bagged 68,857 votes. Sagheer defeated PTI’s candidate with a very thin margin of 49 votes.
The RO in the order said that PTI’s candidate Shabir Awan could not provide substantial evidence of any irregularity throughout the polling process.
The judgment on recounting of votes in the PP-7 constituency of Rawalpindi – where PML-N won against PTI by a nose in the pivotal Punjab by-elections held on Sunday – faced delays.
PTI’s lawyer Rauf Siddiqui complained that the RO has not given the verdict on recounting of votes yet. “We have been told [by ECP] to give our mobile number, and we will be informed on it,” he added.
Further, PML-N lawyer Sardar Taimur Aslam said that they had raised no objection to PTI’s application for recounting.
He added that the RO asked PTI’s counsel four times that in how many polling stations they wanted to have recounting in. However, PML-N’s lawyer said that the applicant did not respond.
Aslam said that he had no idea when the RO would pronounce the reserved verdict while adding that the RO has also said to them that the decision would be sent on the mobile phone.
PTI grabbed 15 of the total 20 seats in the Punjab by-polls, while PML-N won four seats and the remaining one seat went to an independent candidate.
