Lahore elected seven party heads in past

LAHORE : The City possesses a unique record of sending seven politicians to the National Assembly who contested and won from here while leading their respective political party.

In the 2024 general elections, three political figures who also heads a political party are contesting from Lahore that include PMLN founder and supremo Nawaz Sharif, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and President of Istehkam Pakistan Party Abdul Aleem Khan.

Nawaz Sharif is contesting from NA 130, Bilawal from NA 127 and Abdul Aleem Khan from NA 117. However, this is not the first occasion that the top leadership of the party has chosen Lahore as their constituency to contest a general election.

Total 7 politicians have contested and emerged victorious from Lahore. They contested while holding the top office of the party. First such precedent was seen in the 1970 general elections when PPP founder and the sitting head Zulfikar Ali Bhutto contested the election from Lahore. He fielded himself from National West (NW) 60 and emerged victorious with a significant margin against Javaid Iqbal, son of Allama Iqbal, from this constituency.

In that contest, Bhutto got around 78,000 votes whereas Javaid Iqbal as the candidate of Convention Muslim League (PML-C) got around 34,000 votes. This is pertinent to mention that both, Allama Iqbal's son Javaid Iqbal and his son-in-law Mian Salah ud Din contested from Lahore for the National Assembly seats in 1970 but lost.

In the year, 1988, the then Co Chairperson of PPP Benazir Bhutto contested from the same seat from where her father contested in 1970. Benazir Bhutto won that seat with a significant margin. In 1993, PMLN founder and head Nawaz Sharif contested from NA 92 and NA 95. He won both seats with big margins. In 2002, while Sharifs were in exile, Makhdoom Javaid Hashmi was the acting President of PMLN. He contested from NA 123, a seat of Lahore which he won. Interestingly, he lost his home seat from Multan in the hands of PPP's Shah Mehmood Qureshi.

In 2002, the same general election, Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) Chairman Dr Tahir ul Qadri contested from the then NA 127 and won. In the 2018 general elections, while Shehbaz Sharif was leading PMLN and serving as President of Nawaz League, he won the National Assembly and a Provincial Assembly seat from Lahore. Similarly, Imran Khan, the founder and the then Chairman of PTI also contested from the then NA 130, a seat of Lahore and won. In this way, seven political figures have won the general election on the soil of Lahore at a time while they were also holding the top most position in their respective parties.

Amongst the cities of Pakistan, Lahore is the only city from where largest number of former national sportsmen (five) and largest number of women have got elected through direct contest in a general or by-election.