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Thursday March 28, 2024

No private press to be involved in printing ballot papers

By Tariq Butt
June 22, 2018

Islamabad: The unanimously passed poll law prohibits the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to get ballot papers printed from any private printing press.

Section 70 of the Elections Act says the ECP will ensure that the total required ballot papers for the general elections are printed by the presses of the Printing Corporation of Pakistan (PCP) or such other press which is owned and operated by any authority under the control of the federal or a provincial government as may be notified by the ECP for the purpose.

The ECP will ensure that adequate arrangements are made for the security of the presses during the printing of the ballot papers and for the safe custody of the printed papers till delivery to the Returning Officer (RO).

The ECP, pursuant to the finalisation of the list of the polling stations, will determine the constituency-wise requirement of ballot papers based on the formula that the number of ballot papers per station will be rounded off to the next hundred. Rounding off to the next hundred means if the total strength of voters at a polling station is 1201 to 1299 the requirement of ballot papers for that station would be 1300.

After the 2013 general elections, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had painted a big scandal by claiming that the ECP got ballot papers printed from the Urdu Bazaar, Lahore to damage it and to benefit the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). The ECP kept trashing the charge while Imran Khan persisted with his accusation.

A similar match took place on the question of printing of extra ballot papers between the ECP and PTI. However, the ECP said that printing of ballot papers is a highly sensitive, huge and complex process having many dimensions and therefore it takes maximum possible security measures to ensure that every single ballot paper is printed and delivered to the returning officers in a secured manner through a detailed action plan.

It is estimated that the ECP may get nearly seven million additional ballot papers printed for “rounding off” purpose. For the 2013 polls, it had got 11,725,728 extra ballot papers printed. For the 2008 elections, some 11,115,911 additional papers were printed. The highest number of additional ballot papers were printed for the 1988 elections. Some 14,660,869 extra ballot papers were printed for the 1990 polls. In 1993, only 3.52 percent additional ballot papers were printed, which is the minimum as compared to all other elections. Some 10,086,725 extra papers were printed in 1997 and 11,059,310 additional papers were printed in 2002.

Meanwhile, section 93 specifies the persons who may cast their votes by postal ballot in such manner as may be prescribed by the ECP. They include a person who is in the service of Pakistan and his spouse and children, who may apply to the registration officer for enrolment in the electoral area in which they temporarily reside for being in the service of Pakistan; a person appointed by the RO, including police personnel, for the performance of any duty in connection with an election at polling station other than the one at which he is entitled to cast his vote; a person with any physical disability who is unable to travel and holds a National Identity Card (NIC) with a logo for physical disability issued by the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra); and a person detained in a prison or held in custody.

The persons, who, being entitled to do so, intend to cast their vote by postal ballot will apply to the RO of the concerned constituency in which they are voters for ballot papers for voting by postal ballot; and every such application will specify the name of the voter, his address and his serial number in the electoral roll. The RO will upon receipt of an application by a voter send by post to such voter a ballot paper and an envelope bearing on its face a form of certificate of posting, showing the date thereof, to be filled in by the proper official of the post office at the time of posting by the voter. A voter on receiving his ballot paper for voting by postal ballot will record his vote in the prescribed manner and post it to the RO in the envelope sent to him, so as to reach the RO before the consolidation of results by him.