BAHAWALPUR, June 7: The ARD high command is likely to apprise the election commission of the alleged pre-poll rigging in byelection to three Punjab Assembly seats in Bahawalpur district.

The seats - PP-269, PP-275 and PP-276 - were declared vacant after MPAs Sardar Khalid Mahmood Warren, Shoaib Karim and Dr Mohammad Afzal resigned from the assembly membership as well as from the PPP.

It is learnt that although both the main component parties of the ARD - PPP and PML-N - are still at loggerheads over the distribution of seats among their candidates, they are united to point out, what they called, the pre-poll rigging by the ruling coalition.

The PML-N's high command at a meeting held in Lahore on Monday reviewed the ongoing campaign for by-polls, and decided that the EC should be informed about the government's alleged interference in the same.

The PML-N alleged that the ruling party was providing financial assistance to its favourites to impress upon the voters that they should side with its candidates. It also decided that a white paper highlighting the pre-poll rigging should be published.

So far the candidates of both the PPP and the PML-N are in the run. It is also learnt that the PML-N is interested to contest for PP-275 where Khalid Mahmood Jajja, the son of former MNA Chaudhry Mumtaz Ahmad Jajja, is among the five candidates who have filed nomination papers along with PPP's Shakil Mirza.

This is contrary to the Punjab PPP high command's claim that only its candidates will be eligible to contest the polls as all the three seats were vacated by its MPAs. But it seems that the PML-N is bent upon to violate the ARD discipline, and as such its Punjab high command is actively out to expose the pre-poll rigging by the ruling coalition.