Islamabad:

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and other prominent jailed politicians have voted from prison via postal ballots, media reported on Thursday.

However, Khan’s wife Bushra Bibi was unable to vote as she was convicted and arrested after completing the postal voting process, Dawn News reported.

Reports on Wednesday quoted sources from Adiala jail as saying that political leaders who successfully voted by post include former foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, former Punjab chief minister Chaudhry Parvez Ella Greece, Awami Muslim League Chairman Sheikh Rashid and former Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry.

Overall, fewer than 100 inmates at Adiala were able to vote, accounting for only about one percent of the prison’s 7,000 inmates.

Sources said the prison administration only allowed inmates with valid Computerized National Identity Cards (CNICs) to vote, and the reason for the low turnout was that the vast majority of inmates did not have original national identity cards.

“The jail houses criminals, bandits, thieves, convicts of heinous crimes and awaiting trial inmates,” a senior official said.

He said most criminals do not carry CNICs to avoid exposing their identities, while UTP ID cards are usually retained by police stations.

The official said the Adiala jail administration received the postal ballots from the election commission in mid-January and provided them to the inmates. The last date for submissions is January 22.

However, Superintendent of Prisons Asad Javed Warraich extended the time for delivery of ballot papers in sealed envelopes to the District Returning Officers (DROs) of each constituency.

A senior official said since some of the inmates came from remote areas, the exercise was completed at least two weeks before the election to ensure that the inmates were handed over to the DRO before the final counting of votes.

Prison sources said former first lady Bushra Bibi also wanted to vote by postal ballot, but her request could not be accommodated because the process had already been completed while she was in custody.

Bushra Bibi, 49, was being held at Khan’s Bani Gala residence last week after an accountability court sentenced the couple to 14 years in prison in the Toshakana corruption case.

Bushra Bibi’s spokesman Mashal Yousafzai confirmed that the former prime minister’s wife was unable to vote via postal ballot.

Meanwhile, as cash-strapped Pakistan goes to the polls on Thursday, the Press Trust of India called on the public to remember Imran Khan, the jailed founding chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, who it said is fighting to restore dignity to the country. honor and sovereignty and ensure the well-being of its people.

PTI Central Information Minister Raoof Hasan said in a message that 71-year-old Khan gave everything, including his life, for the cause.

“As citizens of this country, we have a debt to repay. We must use our votes to change the face of Pakistan and dismantle a corrupt system that has a vicious stranglehold on the country and its people,” he said in a post. X.

Khan’s PTI party is taking to social media to lead its candidates to contest as independent candidates with a number of different symbols after the Supreme Court ruled to strip it of its electoral symbol – the iconic cricket bat – in a case related to the party’s internal elections. campaign.

Cricketer-turned-politician Khan has been in jail since August last year and was recently sentenced to 10 years, 14 years and 7 years respectively in the Cipher, Toshakana and Idaat (his third illegal marriage) cases. years in prison.

Many other PTI leaders have been languishing in jails across Pakistan following attacks on military facilities across the country, including on military installations, following Khan’s arrest on May 9 in a corruption case.

Khan and his party claim there is no level playing field in the ongoing electoral process.

The PTI leader also blamed the powerful military establishment for preventing him from returning to power.

The electoral body stripped his party of its iconic cricket bat as its electoral symbol, rejected nomination papers from him and other party leaders, and at least one party leader was killed in vote-related violence in the latest A key candidate was indicted in a terrorism case in Lahore.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)