SAHIWAL: Nineteen losing candidates of the second phase of local elections and their 300 supporters on Wednesday dared police to arrest them after marching on the city police station to protest registration of a case.

Having lost elections for the slots of chairman, vice chairman and councillor, they had arranged a gathering at Jogi Chowk on Sunday last to protest what they said rigging. Police registered a case against 22 losing candidates of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf, the Jamaat-i-Islami and some independents and their supporters under 16 MPO.

As the protesters besieged the police station, officials arrested the 19 candidates and detained them in lock-up. They refused to arrest 300 supporters on the plea that such an arrest could be made only after identification through videos.

City police station SHO Masood Ahmed is the complainant in the FIR and interestingly he was not present at the time of arrests.

These candidates blamed the PML-N district leadership, Punjab Minster for Ushr and Zakat Malik Nadeem Kamran, MPA Malik Arshad and MNA Pir Imran Shah for political victimisation through police action.

Sheikh Ijaz, president of Tahaffuz-i-Sahiwal Forum, told the media that “we have been politically victimised for questioning rigging in urban union councils of Sahiwal city.”

DSP Ziaul Haq, along with a heavy contingent of police and Elite Force, remained alert at the police station and had to resort to baton-charge of the crowd to disperse it. Police registered case against nine of the protesters and the DSP said more cases would be instituted if they refused to disperse.

It merits mention that the returning officer of Union Council 6 has already written to the DRO that two bags of rejected votes had been misplaced at polling stations 64 and 69. Shafqat and Sheikh Ijaz contested election in the UC as independent candidates and they both challenged incomplete consolidation of final results by RO Khalid Khan on Nov 23.

The Lahore High Court’s Multan Bench has already asked the Election Commission of Pakistan to stop the gazette notification of UC 6 chairman result which was won by Haji Latif of the PML-N with one vote.

Sarmad Shafqat alleged that the RO consolidated results without counting 85 votes misplaced in two polling stations.

Meanwhile, the opposition parties condemned police action and the Bar Council and different wings of the Anjuman-i-Tajran announced protest.

Published in Dawn, December 10th, 2015