KARACHI: 89 women against 14 NA reserved seats in Sindh
By Habib Khan Ghori
KARACHI, Sept 1: The returning officer for the seats reserved for women in the national assembly, on Sunday rejected the nomination papers of three candidates from Sindh.
The candidates belong to the Peoples Party Parliamentarians, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the Pakistan Muslim League (Q).
The most prominent among the three is former prime minister and chairperson of the Pakistan. The other two are Begum Mumtaz Rashdi and Begum Nuzhat Kamal whose nominations were filed by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the PML(Q) respectively.
Under the electoral reforms, in a house of 332 members of the national assembly there are 60 reserved seats for women to be elected through the proportional representation system on the basis of the total number of general seats secured by each political party from the province concerned.
According to the formula, there are 14 reserved seats for Sindh while from Balochistan 3, from NWFP 8 and from the Punjab 35 seats in the National Assembly.
There were total 92 aspirants against the 14 reserved seats of the national assembly from Sindh whose scrutiny was carried out on Sunday.
After the rejection of the nomination papers of the three candidates, the other prominent aspirants who remain in the run include Dr Hameeda Khuhro, Rashida Pasha, Fiza Junejo, Dr Saeeda Malik, Syeda Zahida Zaidi (Q-A), Shehar Bano Sherry Rehman, Rukia Khanum, Nasima Sultana Akmut, Fauzia Wahab, Nuzhat Pathan(PPP-Parl), Begum Salma Ahmad (PML-F), Dr Farida Ahmed, Razia Shamsuddin (MMA).
Muttahida Majlis-i- Amal: Raana Nasir Khan, Tahira Kokab, Humaira Qureshi, Umme Atia, Kaniz Aisha, Rukkaya, Dr Aziza Saeed, Dr Razia Farook, Shabnam Sultan, Tabassum Yasmeen Khan, and Dr Humera Anjum.
PML(N): Shamim Minhas, Rifaat Jabeen, Kokab Sultana, Dr Syeda Nishat Fatima, Fahmida Bano. PML(F):Farha Naz, and Khursheed Afghan. PML(Q): Shirley Parveen Hyder, Seeman Siddiqui, Farida Baloch, Alia Siddiqui, Meraj Gul.