NA-154: Over 20,000 votes were polled with invalid CNICs or without CNICs

E-Paper | March 03, 2026

MULTAN: The National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) failed to authenticate the thumb impression of only 179 voters in NA-154.

It was revealed in a report submitted by the authority to an election tribunal regarding the verification of thumb impressions on the votes cast in NA-154 (Lodhran) here on Tuesday.

The constituency (NA-154) is among the four, where Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan had been demanding recounting and verification of the thumb impressions.

Also read: LHC rejects plea to stop poll record inspection

The election tribunal had directed Nadra to verify the thumb impression on May 21 on the request of PTI secretary general Jahangir Khan Tareen.

Constituency is among four seats where PTI wants recounting and verification of thumb impressions

According to the report, 218,056 votes cast at 290 polling stations were received by Nadra from the election tribunal for verification, out of which 20,601 votes were with invalid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) numbers or without CNIC numbers.

Similarly, 121 voters were found to be out of constituency, while there were 728 duplicate votes and 587 votes were without thumb impressions, the report says.

It says there were 73,707 votes having authenticated fingerprints, while thumb impression of only 179 votes could not be authenticated.

Nadra could not decipher 122,133 votes that were having fingerprints of bad quality due to unavailability of proposed (magnetic) ink, besides other possibilities. However, CNIC numbers mentioned on counterfoils of these votes having bad thumb impressions were valid.

The seat was won by an independent candidate, Muhammad Siddique Khan Baloch, who later joined the Pakistan Muslim League-N. Mr Tareen had challenged the results and applied for thumb verification.

According to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), Sadiq Baloch had bagged 86, 177 votes against Mr Tareen who stood second with 75, 955 votes. There were 370,150 registered votes, out of which 235,938 were polled. As many as 9,904 votes were rejected and the voting percentage was 67.4.

Tribunal judge Zahid Mehmood has fixed Nov 6 as the next hearing date of the case.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2014

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payndu

Oct 29, 2014 06:51am

No, it must be the CIA in cahoots with RAW and the Mossad, aligned with GEO and the supreme court judges, conspiring to make it seem that Imran Khan didn't outright sweep the elections. I'm protesting by not paying my sewage bill.

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Sunny

Oct 29, 2014 07:06am

It is clear from the above results that only 35% of votes were valid.

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anees zaidvi

Oct 29, 2014 07:07am

Ridiculous!

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Babay

Oct 29, 2014 07:14am

Nadra could not decipher 122133 votes is matter of deep concern and a clear challenge to the transparency of the whole exercise in the entire election of this constituency that prove the allegations already lavelled by IK. Who will be held responsible for this willful criminal negligence contents,ROs,or ECP.

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Oct 29, 2014 07:25am

So what did NADRA do in the basement to fix it to this extent? They replaced 122.133 votes with new entries where CNIC are taken from the voter lists and all of these votes have no thumb impressions. If Mr. tareen get hold of some of these votes, we can get them analyzed them abroad.

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Bonkers

Oct 29, 2014 07:26am

This is very deceiving headline. I guess one has to read the fineprint.

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Mohammad Ali

Oct 29, 2014 07:30am

I think this report is misleading and tries to give the impression in the beginning that only 179 votes were fraudulent which was contradicted later by saying that 20602 were also not verified due to bad ink. If I read first few lines, readers get the impression that voting was fair.

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Oct 29, 2014 07:38am

What a misleading headline. The headline says "only 179 thumb impressions not verifiable", while in the detailed story it says that out of 218,056 votes cast, NADRA could not decipher 122,133 votes because of unverifiable thumb impressions. Can there be a bigger fraud?

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Danish

Oct 29, 2014 07:53am

What about other constituencies... demanded by PTI. Nadra and ECP Don't open those where there is garbage filled???

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Imran

Oct 29, 2014 07:59am

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Shahid

Oct 29, 2014 08:08am

"Nadra could not decipher 122,133 votes" So it means half of the number of cast votes cannot be verified due to low quality ink and other issues. Who is responsible for failing to provide proper ink ?

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Syed Ahmed

Oct 29, 2014 08:08am

PML(N) has stolen mandate. They have no moral authority to rul the country and should be put behind bars.

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Zahid

Oct 29, 2014 08:12am

So the elections weren't rigged. No doubt Imran khan never brings any evidence.

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Gretzky

Oct 29, 2014 08:13am

Oops

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Syed

Oct 29, 2014 08:13am

ECP you are a joke. dont fool us public.

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Usman

Oct 29, 2014 08:20am

Would NADRA have claimed the same under the previous NADRA Chief? When thousands of thumb impressions couldn't be verified in previous recounts, how come all of them can be verified in the constituency Imran Khan wants investigated? How dumb do these people think we are?

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Kal

Oct 29, 2014 08:21am

The most honest election ever! LOLOL.

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Dr Yaqoob

Oct 29, 2014 08:22am

No wonder IK had been screaming since day 1 and no body is listening to provide justice coz it was not dhandlee but dhaandlaa.

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Uxman

Oct 29, 2014 08:32am

Looks like time for NS to go is very near now hope justice prevails

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Arif

Oct 29, 2014 08:41am

20,000 Fake votes!

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Jinnah

Oct 29, 2014 08:42am

This proves there was no large scale rigging as only 121 votes were out of constituency and another 728 votes were duplicate, compared to 218,056 votes that were cast. Meaning only 0.38% of votes were unverifiable. For those without thumb impression of good quality can be verified by the CNIC numbers and those without CNIC numbers can be looked up from the thumb impression and hence can be verified one way or the other. PTI has been crying wolf and now nobody takes it seriously for it complains about everything. The tribunals and courts are working and are the right forum for all such matters.

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Jawad

Oct 29, 2014 08:45am

20600 votes without valid ID , about 10000 votes rejected ? Reason , about 1300 duplicate + no thumb impression ( ? Not rejected ) Winning difference about 10000.. 122000 votes not verifiable thumb impressions ( although cnic valid-- but non verifiable thumb impression puts a big question if the person is real or somebody voted for someone else ?? ) -- basically about 154000 votes in question while winning margin only 10000. ( ID number should match the thumb or finger print--) And -- it took them more than a year and a half to come up with these numbers --- that's the best they could do ! So --

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Jawad

Oct 29, 2014 08:50am

So----- reason for 10000 votes rejection?? And why votes with no IDCard or invalid CNIC -- not rejected -- and why votes with NO thumb impression or duplicates Not rejected??? These total to about 32000 ---- Even if you don't add 122000 votes with invalid thumb or finger prints - Simple math----- how could be there a winner???? And those 10000 rejected votes? Whose were those ?

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Suhaib Khalid

Oct 29, 2014 08:51am

It's interesting to see the heading of the news only 179 thumb impressions not verifiable!!!! Who the news reporter is fooling? Seems like he got A lifafa......

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Ali zafar

Oct 29, 2014 09:02am

And nawaz says that these were the most transparent elections in the history of Pakistan. Goes to show that his understanding of transparency allows 35-40% of unverified votes. Day by day Imran Khans claims are proving to be true.

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Affan dawood

Oct 29, 2014 09:06am

The Winning difference was 9k 20k votes were on wrong CNIC numbers i-e Fake votes , keeping aside those which were un verifiable

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Zahid

Oct 29, 2014 09:10am

@Babay read the full sentence. But for those votes the CNIC numbers were valid so those votes are fine.

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Usman

Oct 29, 2014 09:11am

What about the invalid votes more than 20, 000. Don't mislead the nation NADRA.

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Zahid

Oct 29, 2014 09:12am

@PS again, those votes were verified by the CNIC.

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zafar

Oct 29, 2014 09:22am

And what say you now PTI?

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Shahbaz

Oct 29, 2014 09:28am

Elections were nit rigged massively....These flaws in Elections are needed to be eradicated thoroughly...PTI must do Politics on Fact Basis not on assumptions...

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Concerned Citizen

Oct 29, 2014 09:34am

So there were some serious irregularities. However, does it make the voting void? I don't think so. Let's move on and reform instead of crying over spilled milk. :)

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MAD

Oct 29, 2014 09:43am

Most of the votes could not be verified. Yet your headline says something else.

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Canadawala

Oct 29, 2014 09:49am

@Syed Ahmed Grapes are sour!

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Yousuf

Oct 29, 2014 09:58am

Nadra report is an attempt to a softer landing in creating sufficient doubts which may result in ECP declaring earlier result to be valid. It begs a question as to why it took that long to publish the report and real reason invicting of previous head of NADRA including subjecting him to serious personal threats. Nadra report be treated hostile with extending more support to the container folks seeking justice. It may ultimately land before the Court to declare 2013 elections inconclusive.

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Haroon Rashid

Oct 29, 2014 10:20am

Stupid piece of Heading to the news. only 179 votes were not verified meaning those were good but could not find them in database. Heading should have been 122,000 thumb impressions were too bad to be found in Nadra database.

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Hussain

Oct 29, 2014 10:23am

@Syed No need befool those simple guys who are proudly following a "slightly mad" like IK...

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ABAP

Oct 29, 2014 10:31am

This is very deceiving headline.

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Raja

Oct 29, 2014 10:46am

What about thouse 122,000 votes that are unverifiable? If ECP was responsible for use of bad ink, why were the officials not punished? I dont support khan but the people are not that blind when govt authorities themselves admit unverifiable votea in most constituencies. Imran khan may be childish or unreasonable at occasions but his demands regarding rigging seem reasonable.

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Pakistani

Oct 29, 2014 10:54am

@Bonkers Absolutely deceiving headline, when you read the report itself.

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Hassan

Oct 29, 2014 10:55am

@payndu i think you just read the headline and jump to the conclusion, read the article first "20,601 votes were with invalid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) numbers or without CNIC numbers." so your sarcastic comment maybe right (without sarcasm)

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Pakistani

Oct 29, 2014 10:56am

@Syed Shameless ECP, which has miserably failed to do their assigned job.

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Rizwan Liaqat

Oct 29, 2014 10:57am

@Jinnah Did you forget to read the following part? "out of which 20,601 votes were with invalid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) numbers or without CNIC numbers." That's 20,601 bogus votes. Not even talking about the 122,133 unverifiable votes. Have they carried out the reconciliation of the Form 14s issued that day with the final number reported by ROs? Massive rigging.

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Haider Rehman

Oct 29, 2014 10:58am

"20,601 votes were with invalid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) numbers or without CNIC numbers. Similarly, 121 voters were found to be out of constituency, while there were 728 duplicate votes and 587 votes were without thumb impressions, the report says." Misleading headline Dawn ...

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Sohail

Oct 29, 2014 11:00am

@Zahid The CNIC was valid but how could you verify the thumb impression if you can't decipher it?

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ALi

Oct 29, 2014 11:05am

For all Allamas, election specialists out there. For your reading http://fiverupees.com/2014/07/07/fingerprint-verification/

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Confused

Oct 29, 2014 11:07am

American elections don't use thumb impressions. Dhandli!

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Hassan

Oct 29, 2014 11:20am

I like how dawn has conveniently gave a heading "Only 179 thumb impressions not verifiable" even though in the report it says that "Nadra could not decipher 122,133 votes" ..ahem ahem 122,133-179=121,954 so Dawn just missed 121,954 in the count for invalid bogus votes. Bravo Dawn!

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Amin Hussain

Oct 29, 2014 11:20am

Brilliant work phrasing the headline there.... in actuality, 122,133 thumb impressions plus these 179 were unverifiable! Plus, given the margin of about 10,000, the rejected votes and the multiple votes cast are hardly inconsequential. Of course, the biggest question is why this couldnt have been done a year ago?

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Mastuj

Oct 29, 2014 11:26am

218,056 votes cast at 290 polling stations were received by Nadra from the election tribunal for verification, out of which 20,601 votes were with invalid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) numbers or without CNIC numbers. Enough said.

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Kaizer

Oct 29, 2014 11:28am

As you remember, not long ago a neutral chairman of nadra was sacked. By this I can say the govt had already planning for long time hence it took so long for verification-- something in nadra basement is very wrong!!

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Saifur Rahman

Oct 29, 2014 11:35am

@payndu Looks like the "misleading" headline was enough for you to come to this conclusion.

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Shan

Oct 29, 2014 11:38am

What a misleading title for the article. More than 20000 votes were with invalid cnic numbers and the margin of victory was about 10000. How ich more clear evidence of rigging does one need?

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Kamran

Oct 29, 2014 11:46am

only 179. what about the 122,133 bogus votes? ahem ahem, you don't always have to get IK wrong.

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Umair

Oct 29, 2014 11:55am

No where in the world are votes finger print verified. Neither have any previous election required finger print verifications.

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Dr Javaid Khan

Oct 29, 2014 11:55am

The headline of this report is misleading to say the least.This report has once again proved the point that Elections were massively rigged,PTI candidate lost by only 10'000 votes and 20,000 ballot papers had either wrong or no identity card numbers on them.So far about two dozen constituency have been opened up for verification and more or less similar results are found.Sooner our Supreme Court declare these election null and void better it iis for the country.Those responsible for not doing their duties properly during elections must be punished iin the court of law,

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Umair

Oct 29, 2014 11:57am

CNIC numbers mentioned on counterfoils of these votes having bad thumb impressions were valid.

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shafeeq

Oct 29, 2014 11:57am

Are you ready for election 2015 support to imran khan?

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Aziz

Oct 29, 2014 12:25pm

The elections were not rigged. TRUE! They were completely sabotaged.

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Umar

Oct 29, 2014 12:32pm

NS sb, show some moral values if you have left any and leave your seat immediately. Your complete picture has been seen by public. Now what more you want ? I think you deserve this over increasing slogan GoNawazGo

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Talha

Oct 29, 2014 01:05pm

Dawn the heading the suggests that there wasn't much of a problem in the constituency under scrutiny but if one reads the article then it is quite evident that the elections were properly conducted in the constituency. Please show balance in reporting and kindly change the heading which describes the entire report. I hope Dawn doesn't fall from its own standards of balanced reporting.

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Parvez

Oct 29, 2014 01:18pm

After 18 months to come up with this is a joke.........knowing that original data has been deliberately burnt and fabrication of new data is not beyond the cope of this administration.

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Nouman

Oct 29, 2014 01:19pm

Misleading headline. Bad journalism.

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Salman Tarik Kureshi

Oct 29, 2014 01:19pm

Does this mean that those who are "verifying the thumb prints" can tell who voted for whom? I would like a clarification because, if so, then it would negate secrecy of the ballot and would constitute the most extreme possible violation of the fundamental rights of the voters concerned. It would also be a gross violation of the Constitution, possibly attracting Article 6. Please do clarify, if anyone can do so authoritatively.

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Salman Tarik Kureshi

Oct 29, 2014 01:24pm

@Jawad This reader is obviously incapable of simple Arithmetic.

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Abdul Manan

Oct 29, 2014 01:24pm

Sadiq Baloch had bagged 86, 177 an independent candidate easily win through facts and figures,Tareen should bring case in CIA facts authority!

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Faisal

Oct 29, 2014 01:43pm

@Jinnah 20600 votes without valid ID , about 10000 votes rejected , you are right.... PTI always cry , HAIN NA? BTW according to these statistics Tareen lost with margin of 10000 votes only.

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bilal

Oct 29, 2014 01:57pm

Shame on you ECP

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Noor

Oct 29, 2014 01:59pm

I have a question here, the forensic labs read thumb impressions from anything how com NADRA cannot read inked fingerprints, now i can see with some certainty, Imran is right!!!

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MrA2Z

Oct 29, 2014 02:05pm

Misleading headline, how 20,601 votes were valid specially when they had invalid CNIC?

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MrA2Z

Oct 29, 2014 02:24pm

Why NADRA only received 218,056 votes for verification?

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Pakistani

Oct 29, 2014 02:25pm

What a shameful performance by ECP. What have they delivered to the nation - looking to be really a rigged election!!! The least ECP can do is tendering of resignations by ECP members. But they want to continue enjoying their salaries and perks without discharging their duties!! ECP has landed nation in a mess due to their conduct - the most rigged elections in our history.

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Pakistani

Oct 29, 2014 02:52pm

@Jawad What a joke in conducting of 2013 elections by our ECP. Who can call these fair & tranparent elections!!

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MrA2Z

Oct 29, 2014 03:01pm

@Umair Don't comment using pick and choose policy. 20,601 votes were included in the final count. Those votes have invalid or no CNICs

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Mohsin

Oct 29, 2014 03:09pm

Is there going to be any investigation carried out against people who casted duplicate votes? Can someone please try to identify the people behind valid thumb impression, but invalid CNIC numbers? Why do we never get to the root cause of such problems? Let's investigate the people and find out why such discrepancies or better yet illegal action was taken?!?

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MrA2Z

Oct 29, 2014 03:12pm

@Jinnah Are you joking? 20,601 so called valid votes were included in the final count. 1st Q: Why NADRA received 218,056 votes for verification where are the remaining 7,978 votes 2nd Q: Why 20,601 votes were included in the final recount even when they have invalid CNICs or no CNICs. 3rd Q: How 121 out of constituency votes, 728 duplicate votes and 587 votes without thumb impression were included in the final count? How they were marked as valid. 4th Q: Why NADRA did not give the breakdown of 20,601 so called fake votes by candidates?

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Kamran

Oct 29, 2014 03:50pm

victory margin is roughly 10,000 votes. 20,000 votes with valid CNIC. 20,000>10000. So what conclusion can we draw from this? and what about the 122,000 votes which can't be verified? Who is saying these elections were fair and transparent?

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Ali

Oct 29, 2014 03:56pm

The things is Dawn should have published the number of votes to each candidate. Let say what ever votes were verifiable by NADRA, now we have sample of bogus vote. If these all votes were casted to PMLN, then only we can say that this was massive corruption but how come we can assume a corruption without knowing how much vote were taken by each candidate. Remember there were one clip in which Tareen supporter was rigging....may be these unverifiable votes were those already caught on vedio

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umar

Oct 29, 2014 04:18pm

@PS in total agreement with you.......case of pulling wool over ones eyes

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umar

Oct 29, 2014 04:35pm

If all interested parties were working to the betterment of Pakistan than there has to be fresh elections ,with clear mandate for free and fair elections.The public has become too polarised, reading the opinions of the readers

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Z Khan

Oct 29, 2014 04:37pm

it shows how important is to introduce Electronic voting machines in next elections

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kHAN

Oct 29, 2014 04:45pm

Authentication of IK's claim. Every passing day it is proving that the 22013 elections were fraud. What supreme court is doing? IK's protest is legitimate. Present assemblies are not the representative of common people who got out of their homes and voted for the change.

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Malveros

Oct 29, 2014 05:05pm

Well done Nadra and ECP. Let the law (election tribunals) take it's course before making any judgement. Elections 2013 are the fairest compared to the previous ones.

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ebrahim

Oct 29, 2014 05:28pm

All elections are fraud in Pakistan . Here might is right. No decent person can win a election.

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Liaquat Ali

Oct 29, 2014 06:10pm

If this constituency audit is typical of the election for 2013, then no wonder NS doesn't want any audit for the whole election!! It looks like the whole process was a complete and utter mess. How anyone can justify or claim that the election was fair is beyond me.

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Sultan Ahmed.

Oct 29, 2014 06:45pm

Rigging has been proved which has committed on vast and high level. Re elections in the country has become indispensable.Government is not a government to which called a representatives of the people It is not a pure democratically elected government . It is dire need of the time midterm election would be held as soon as may be.

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Jawad

Oct 29, 2014 06:45pm

If out of these , especially 20000 that are with fake CNIC numbers --- the winner has most of these -- he can not be judged winner. Especially if the rejected votes (10000 ) are mostly PTIs. Thats a difference of 30000 votes But -- if it's the other way around -- that is. those 20000 votes are mostly PTIs then next step would be to somehow verify those 120000 votes with bad thumb prints. After all nobody's votes should be disenfranchised. Government should do it's best to validate the votes.

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FAKHIR ALI

Oct 29, 2014 06:57pm

imran khan as honest leader but my govt is corpt nawaz you ma be go plz

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Sultan Alvi

Oct 29, 2014 08:30pm

@Sunny : Results of NA 154 show clearly that there was absolutely no rigging (only 65% of the votes could not be verified). Pakistan Zindabaad, long-live corruption, long-live judiciary.

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Truth will Always Prevail

Oct 30, 2014 02:31am

There are over whelming proof the 2013 election was massively rigged and yet Supreme court rules out 2013 election was rigged. Nothing could be more damaging to a nation where supreme court is fail to deliver justice to the peoples of Pakistan in the face of massively rigged election one wonder if these judges are really sitting in a court to deliver justice or please the corrupts in power?

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