KARACHI, Aug 20: The Pakistan Peoples Party claiming unprecedented rigging in the by-elections of NA-229 Tharparkar-I constituency has refused to concede the poll results in which Shaukat Aziz was declared elected with huge margin.

Flanked by PPP legislators, leader of opposition Nisar Ahmad Khuhro held Sindh Chief Minister Dr Arbab Rahim responsible for violation of law and rigging in the by-elections. They said that they would file petition challenging the outcome of by-election of the constituency despite no hope of fair treatment from the election commission.

Mr Khuhro was addressing a crowded press conference at Karachi Press Club on Friday afternoon where many legislators who had performed the duty of polling agents and worked for Dr Mahesh Malani, candidate of the joint opposition, narrated their woe at the hands of law enforcement personnel.

They were stopped and searched like outlaws, even women MPAs were not spared who were harrased and detained and only allowed to go to polling stations on the polling day, they alleged.

Recalling that the Human Rights Commission had refused to accept this election as fair and transparent, Mr Khuhro demanded that the election of NA-229 should be declared null and void as this election had put the democratic institutions at stake.

He announced that all those Awam Dost Taulaka and Tehsil Nazims and PPP office bearers, who worked against PPP nominee Dr Mahesh Malani and sided with the chief minister, were removed from their offices and the party chairperson would be recommended to remove them from the party.

Nisar Khuhro said that they had enough evidences of rigging and foul play in the polling and soon the white paper would be published. He said if the report that Mr Aziz had retained the Attock seat and surrendered the Tharparker-I constituency was correct, another by-election had to be held soon.

Former chief minister and senior PPP leader Syed Qaim Ali Shah contested the claim of Arbab Rahim about his ancestral constituency. He asked how it was possible for him to make exact prediction that PML candidate would win with over 150,000 votes while PPP candidate would beg only 10,000 votes until manipulated.

He also criticized the attitude of the election commission which did not respond to the complaints about violation of laws and rules by the ruling party. He said that the complaints were rejected without appointing any officer to enquire into the polling process.

Terming the elections cruel rather than transparent, he said that it was a unique election in the world history where the outgoing prime minister nominated another party man as the prime minister and the nominated prime minister nominated another person who was not qualified at that time to hold the office of the prime minister as his successor. This all manifested that everything was planned and the election was merely a formality, he added.

MPAs Makhdoom Jameeluzzaman, Rafique Engineer, Ayaz Soomro, Jam Mehtab, Nawab Wasan and others also narrated the incidents of harassment and keeping them away from the election process.

Nisar Khuhro alleged that Nawab Wasan and others were detained in Mirpurkhas a day before by-election while MPA Sassi Palejo and others were stopped from travelling to Mithi from Badin, adds PPI.

According to him, in rural areas of Thar, 90 per cent votes were cast at 70 polling stations and when MPA Sassi Palejo tried to check national identity cards of some voters to prevent rigging, she was expelled from polling station and detained till end of the polling process.

On the occasion, he presented some "proofs" of fake votes cast in favour of PML candidate Shaukat Aziz and criticized Sindh Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim for imposing an "anti-Sindh" person on Thar to retain the seat of chief minister. Other PPP leaders including Aftab Shaban Merani, Rashid Rabbani, Syed Murad Ali Shah, Nasreen Chandio and Sassi Palejo were also present during the press conference.