ISLAMABAD, Nov 29: The Election Commission has received 13,490 nomination papers from candidates for 265 National Assembly and 566 provincial assembly (general) seats for the coming elections.

According to a handout issued by the commission here on Thursday, 4,118 candidates have filed papers for the National Assembly and 9,372 for the provincial assembly seats.

Polling for the 272 general seats in the National Assembly and 577 in the provincial assemblies will be held on January 8. Due to the security situation, the Election Commission has extended till Dec 6 the date for submitting nomination papers for seven NA and 11 PA seats in Swat, Shangla and Hangu districts and Kurram and North Waziristan agencies.

The EC received 1,358 nomination papers for reserved seats for women and minorities in the national and provincial assemblies. Sixty seats are reserved for women and 10 for minorities in the National Assembly.

A total of 2,019 nomination papers have been filed for 148 NA general seats from Punjab, 990 for 61 seats from Sindh, 561 for 35 seats from the NWFP, 293 for 14 seats from Balochistan and 191 for 12 seats from the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

The EC said that 4,517 papers had been filed for 297 general seats of the Punjab assembly, 2,293 for 130 seats of the Sindh assembly, 1,556 for 99 seats of the NWFP assembly and 1,006 for 51 seats of the Balochistan assembly.

A total of 301 women have filed papers for 60 reserved NA seats and 95 candidates have filed papers for 10 NA seats reserved for non-Muslims. As many as 155 women filed papers for 35 reserved seats in the NA from Punjab, 76 for 14 seats from Sindh, 48 for eight seats from the NWFP and 22 for three seats from Balochistan.

In the four provincial assemblies, 700 candidates are in the run for 128 reserved seats for women and 262 for 23 seats for minorities.

A total of 399 women have filed papers for 66 reserved seats in the Punjab assembly, 138 for 29 Sindh assembly seats, 110 for 22 seats in the NWFP assembly and 53 for 11 seats in the Balochistan assembly.

As many as 117 candidates are in the run for eight minorities’ seats in the Punjab assembly, 72 for nine seats in the Sindh assembly and 37 and 36 candidates for three reserved seats each in NWFP and Balochistan assemblies, respectively.