In what is a first in Pakistan’s electoral history, a candidate received negative votes in a polling station of his constituency in the recently conducted 2024 General Elections that were mired with controversy amid widespread rigging claims.
Former Finance Minister KP and senior leader PTI Taimur Khan Jhagra contested elections for KP’s provincial assembly from his home constituency of PK79 Peshawar and lost to Jalal Khan of PML-N by 4,536 votes, with the former receiving 11,495 votes and the latter securing 16,031.
In one of the polling stations of his constituency, namely PS 16, Jhagra received a comical ‘negative 33’ votes, written ‘-33’ on the ECP copy of Form-45, while Jalal Khan received 60 votes.
However, the copy of Form-45 that Jhagra received from the presiding officer on election night clearly shows he received 93 votes while Jalal Khan received zero votes in PS16.
The copy of these two discrepant Form-45s were shown and discussed on Senior journalist and anchorperson Mansoor Ali Khan’s YouTube channel, where Jhagra was a guest for a podcast aimed at ‘dissecting’ the latter’s constituency of PK79.
Many other forms of tampering were clearly visible with excessive use of ‘blanco’ in some polling station results while zeroes and ones were allegedly placed behind and in front of actual numbers to give Jalal Khan extra votes and reduce Jhagra’s count.
A negation of votes however has not yet been seen in any of the many other disputed election results this time around or in previous elections.
Here’s a screenshot of the Form-45 in question, courtesy Mansoor Ali Khan’s YouTube Channel:
“I have never seen negative votes in an election, ever”, commented Mansoor with amazement.
Jhagra along with many PTI candidates who lost in similar fashion have challenged the results in the courts and some have been directed to the ECP for resolution of their issues with the results.
However, as per Jhagra, matter are moving very slowly.
“Candidates across 9 Peshawar seats having been ping-ponged across ROs, DROs, and ECP to try to get attested copies of the supposed Forms 45 that tally with the Forms 47 of the result. This is happening despite high court orders,” Jhagra alleged on 18th of March.
Pakistani courts are currently flooded with petitions challenging the election results with the Lahore High Court (LHC) receiving the majority of these petitions, while the Islamabad High Court (IHC) and the Sindh High Court (SHC) have also received a few.
