LAHORE: As the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid on Monday claimed that it had begun talks for seat adjustment with the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) in Punjab, the latter denied any such development.

“The PML-Q-PTI talks for seat adjustment in the upcoming election are underway,” PML-Q information secretary Kamil Ali Agha told Dawn.

Commenting on the statement of PTI information secretary Fawad Chaudhry that Imran Khan’s party would not go to the polls in alliance with any other party, Mr Agha said: “PML-Q-PTI talks are being held at some level and it it is not necessary everyone (like Fawad Chaudhry) knows about it. Talks on seat adjustment between the two parties have also been confirmed by PTI vice-chairman Shah Mahmud Qureshi,” he said.

Mr Agha further said there had been an understanding between the two parties that they would not let PML-N win in Punjab. “There are several seats in Punjab where our candidates lost the last election by a margin of 2,000 or so votes. We are sitting together to analyse this and hopefully will workout an understanding at the end of the day in this regard,” he said.

As the PML-N, PPP and PML-Q leaders are joining the PTI, the Chaudhrys of Gujrat believe that still they have ‘electables’ in Punjab.

Fawad Chaudhry on the other hand said: “We have made it clear that we (PTI) will go into the election without having an alliance with any party. The reports of PTI-PML-Q alliance talks are not true,” he insisted.

Our Correspondent in Gujrat Adds: A PML-Q leader told Dawn that in the first round of talks both the sides had discussed the districts where seat adjustment could be made on national as well as provincial assembly seats. “Both parties had selected the districts of Attock, Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Chakwal, Gujrat, Mandi Bahauddin, Gujranwala, Vehari, Sahiwal, Bahawalpur, Rahim Yar Khan, Layya, Faisalabad and Dera Ghazi Khan for the seat adjustment.

He said seat adjustment between the two opposition parties might be made on some 25 National Assembly and around 40 Punjab Assembly constituencies in the said districts.

A source said some PTI leaders who did not find seat adjustment in their interest were against the idea. “Fawad Chaudhary who was a PML-Q candidate in 2013 general elections from Jhelum on a NA seat, had contested the by-elections from there in 2016 as a PTI nominee after death of PML-N MNA Nawabzada Raja Iqbal Mehdi, also wants to contest on a PA seat from Jhelum while PML-Q has demanded both PA seats falling under Fawad’s NA constituency for its nominees Abid Jutana and Arif Chaudhary during the initial seat adjustment talks,” a source said.

Published in Dawn, May 22nd, 2018