Election tribunal imposes fine on MQM-P MNA for not filing reply

An election tribunal of the Sindh High Court (SHC) on Monday imposed a fine of Rs100,000 on Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) National Assembly member Sadiq Iftikhar for not filing comments on an election petition filed by Sindh Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief and NA-238 East candidate Haleem Adil Sheikh against the election results of the constituency.

The tribunal headed by Justice Adnan Iqbal Chaudhry observed that the MQM-P MNA’s counsel did not file any reply on the petition despite the fact that he was directed on June 14 to file comments in seven days.

The counsel for the MQM-P MNA sought more time to file comments on the petition. The tribunal issued a notice to the petitioner’s counsel on the plea of Iftikhar seeking extension of time to file comments on the petition. However, the tribunal imposed a fine of Rs100,000 under the Elections Act on the MQM-P MNA and directed him to deposit the amount before the Nazir of the court.

Sheikh, who contested the elections as a PTI-backed candidate, had submitted in the petition that he had secured the highest 84,049 votes from NA-238 East as per Form 45 received from all the polling stations, but his votes were shown reduced to 36,885 votes in the Form 47 prepared by the returning officer (RO).

The PTI leader had claimed in the petition that the MQM-P candidate had actually secured 10,302 votes as per the Form 45 of the polling stations but the RO in the Form 47 declared the votes polled by him to be 54,885.

Sheikh’s counsel Ali Tahir had informed the SHC that the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) had failed to upload Form 45 for the 292 polling stations of the constituency disregarding the legal requirement to do so within 14 days of polling as stipulated in the Section 92(10) of the Elections Act.

The counsel submitted that the Form 45 of the polling stations had been tampered with in favour of the respondent candidate and the votes cast in favour of the petitioner were superstitiously transferred in his favour.

He said the failure of the ECP to detect and rectify these discrepancies in a timely manner raised serious questions about the efficacy of the electoral oversight mechanism in place, also calling into question the integrity of the entire electoral process.

The counsel had submitted that the uploading of these manipulated forms sparked a wave of outrage on various social media platforms with individuals swiftly denouncing the evident rigging; however, in response to the mounting pressure and public scrutiny, the ECP opted to remove the Form 45 from its website, effectively removing the entire folder pertaining to NA-238.

He had further said the failure of election officers to conduct the consolidation in accordance with the applicable provisions of the Election Act and rules had put a question mark on the fairness of the polls conducted in the constituency.

The SHC was requested to withdraw and set aside the notification with regard to declaring Iftikhar as the returned candidate and restrain him from attending sessions of the National Assembly till a decision on the petition.