TIMERGARA: Deputy commissioner, Lower Dir, Sarmad Saleem Akram on Saturday formed a committee to probe into the alleged irregularities and violation of rules regarding handling of postal ballots in the district.

The committee will investigate the case and fix responsibility. The issue of postal ballots surfaced here the other day when a PTI councillor from Timergara, Tauseef Ahmad, alleged that three teachers Sadiq Ahmad, Shafiqur Rehman and Ikramullah, affiliated with Jamaat-i-Islami, had illegally collected postal ballots of government schools’ teachers from the Timergara post office.

Speaking at a press conference here, PTI candidate for PK-15, Shafiullah, advocate Abu Bakar and Imran Takkar of ANP and Shahab Utmani of PPP demanded of the Election Commission of Pakistan to take notice of the matter and punish all those who illegally collected postal ballots of other persons from the post office.

They said that the ballots were shifted to government primary school, Timergara. They claimed that Mr Tauseef recovered a total of 35 postal ballots, including 23 of provincial assembly and 12 of National Assembly constituency NA-6, Dir-I, from the school.

On the report of Mr Sadiq, the Timergara police caught Mr Tauseef while he was on his way home with the ballots and brought him to the police station. The police also brought the concerned teachers and post master Abdullah to the police station. The post master was detained, but later released when the deputy commissioner ordered an inquiry.

The postal ballots which were not opened yet were handed over to the deputy commissioner who returned them to the post office with directives to distribute the ballots with utmost care.

Meanwhile, JI activists Yousaf Khan, Mohammad Shoaib and others told a press conference that the postal ballots were sent to GPS Timergara which had been serving as a centre. They said that Mr Tauseef snatched the sealed ballot papers from the school’s head teacher Sadiq and wanted to take them home. They claimed that the police recovered the ballots from the councillor.

They also demanded of the government to register a case against Mr Tauseef. The deputy commissioner formed an investigation committee and has returned the postal ballots to the post office.

Meanwhile, over 300 male and female presiding officers (POs) on Saturday returned homes without installation of electronic result transmission system (RTS) on their smart phones due to fault in the Nadra’s main server and downlink of internet system, sources told this correspondent.

The POs for NA-6 and NA-7, Lower Dir, were invited to the ROs offices for taking oath, installation of RTS and getting PIN code for their smart phones for speedy transmission of form 45, the result count form to the commission and concerned ROs.

Published in Dawn, July 22nd, 2018