The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has issued notices to Prime Minister Imran Khan and 141 other lawmakers over suspected misreporting of election campaign expenditures, ECP sources told DawnNewsTV on Tuesday.

The ECP has directed the lawmakers to submit their respective replies to the notices within seven days.

According to the sources, the commission's political finance wing issued notices after finding irregularities in the details of the expenditures submitted by the lawmakers.

The notices have been served to 96 members of the National Assembly, 38 Punjab MPAs and eight Khyber Pakhtunkhwa MPAs.

Besides PM Khan, the notices were served to Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar, Speaker Punjab Assembly Pervez Illahi, former premier Raja Pervez Ashraf, former defence minister Khawaja Asif, Punjab Information Minister Fayyaz Chohan and others.

The ECP had forbidden candidates contesting for National Assembly seats from spending more than Rs4 million on their election campaigns. The campaign expenditure of those contesting for provincial assembly seats could not exceed Rs2 million.

ECP had also ordered candidates could only withdraw money from bank accounts that had been declared as their election accounts.

According to ECP authorities, investigation of the accounts provided by the candidates was a legal requirement and action will be taken against those who were found guilty of overspending.

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