February 14, 2008	Thursday	Safar 06, 1429

ISLAMABAD, Feb 13: The Election Commission on Wednesday rejected allegations levelled by PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif about transparency of the electoral process and said the commission was proceeding in accordance with the law and to carry out its obligation to hold transparent polls.

Election Commission secretary Kanwar Mohammad Dilshad said in a statement that the commission had posted details of polling stations and other records on the ECP website. “Anybody desiring any information can contact assistant election commissioners for guidance.”

He said holding free, fair and transparent polls were the responsibility of the commission. “We are making every possible effort to make the elections free, fair and transparent.”

He said the EC had set up complaint cells at the provincial headquarters and the secretariat in Islamabad to take cognizance of complaints of candidates and political parties. He said that notices were being served on parties violating the code of conduct and returning officers were taking up each and every complaint.

Mr Dilshad also rejected allegations about electoral rolls and said a number of steps had been taken to make these rolls error-free and draft electoral rolls had been displayed for inviting objections, corrections and changes.

About postal ballots, he said there was a procedure for getting the postal ballots on a prescribed form. He said this year 1,681,000 postal ballots had been printed and according to the information received from across the country by the due date of Dec 28, about 80,000 postal ballots were issued.

During the elections in 2002, 54,062 postal ballots were issued.

Mr Dilshad said the Election Commission did not receive any complaint about the postal ballots and denied that the commission had issued any ballot paper with the symbol of ‘Cycle’.

He said the commission regarded all parties as equal and political leaders should avoid hurling baseless allegations and ensure the conduct of polls in a peaceful manner.

Talking to Dawn, Kanwar Dilshad said the commission had completed scrutiny of around 1,500 code violation complaints filed by various candidates. He said that district and session judges had conducted a thorough scrutiny of all complaints and found that most of them were not genuine, adding that written investigation reports had been sent to each complainant and also put on the ECP website.