PML-N wins Vehari and Jhelum by-elections

BUREWALA/JHELUM: PML-N candidate Yousaf Kaseliya won PP-232 (Vehari-I) by-polls by a margin of 1,056 votes on Tuesday.

According to unofficial and unconfirmed result, Kaseliya got 51,323 votes while PTI candidate Ayesha Nazir Jutt bagged 50,267 votes. The turnout remained about 50 per cent. The polling began at 8am and continued till 5pm. No untoward incident was reported from the constituency. However, minor brawls between supporters of an independent candidate and the PML-N candidate were reported at Chak 181/EB and Umeda Jamlera.

Kaseliya cast his vote in his native Chak 225/EB while Ayesha Jatt cast her vote in her native Chak 239/EB. The district police had made stringent security measures on 157 polling stations. A total of 2,100 policemen, 1,500 Rangers and 150 army personnel performed the duty. Vehari DCO Ali Akbar Bhatti and DPO Ch Saleem visited the sensitive polling stations.

In Jhelum, the PML-N candidate won the by-elections on NA-63 Jhelum-II on Wednesday. The ruling party’s candidate Raja Matloob bagged 82,896 votes followed by PTI’s candidate who obtained 74,819 votes.

Earlier, the voting process on both the constituencies ended at 5pm. According to the Election Commission Punjab office, the total number of registered voters was 427,757 for NA-63 Jhelum-II. The voting process took place at 976 polling booths (male 514, female 462) of 314 polling stations. As many as 314 presiding officers, 976 assistant presiding officers and 976 polling officers would supervise the election process. The seat fell vacant after the death of PML-N leader Malik Iqbal Mehdi who secured the NA-63 seat by getting 116,013 votes in the general elections 2013.