June 17, 2006	Saturday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 20, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, June 16: An AJK lawmaker on Friday called for deployment of army to ensure free and impartial polling in the Kashmiri refugees’ constituencies located in Pakistan. “I have been repeatedly making this demand that elections in the refugees’ constituencies must be held under the supervision of the army so as to remove apprehensions of the candidates regarding their impartiality,” said MLA Raja Mujahid.

Of the 41 constituencies of AJK Legislative Assembly, he said, 12 were equally divided among the refugees from the valley and Jammu regions of the occupied Kashmir, settled in Pakistan.

AJK residents settled in Pakistan could also contest from any of the six seats reserved for the migrants from Jammu. Nine of those constituencies were located in the Punjab while the remaining constituencies fall in the NWFP, Balochistan and Sindh.

“I have full faith in AJK Chief Election Commissioner and I believe that deployment of army in the polling stations in Pakistan will help accomplish him his mission - holding of transparent elections,” Mr Mujahid said who would be contesting next month’s elections from LA-35, Jammu-VI.

He also supported a condition by the election commission that voters should also bring a photocopy of national identity card to handover to the polling staff to claim their ballot paper.

It may be noted here that several political parties were opposed to the condition, saying that it would drastically cut down the voter turnout. But Mr Mujahid stressed that the CEC should not waive this condition.