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PTI second largest party in terms of votes in Karachi

KARACHI — The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) has emerged as the second largest political force in the elections in the city — posing a threat to the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), which bagged majority of seats in Karachi despite accusations by all other parties contesting in the city of massive rigging.

According to the results released on Tuesday afternoon, the PTI candidates put up a decent fight against MQM candidates in most of the national and provincial assembly seats.

Even though, not a single PTI candidate has won so far from the city, officials of the election commission admitted that they have clinched the second position in terms of votes cast.

This, in itself, is a significant change from previous elections as the PTI managed to get up to 50,000 votes in more than a couple of seats and relegated the PPP and the PML-N to third and fourth spot in terms of number of votes cast.

PTI Karachi chief Dr Arif Alvi, who contested on NA-250, felt that if free and fair elections were held, the party would have won at least 10 seats.

“Soon after the election started three to four hours behind schedule, some people started firing in the area harassing the voters,” he recalled. “Later, our agents were kidnapped and a few of them were harassed,” he alleged.

Meanwhile, MQM deputy convener Farooq Sattar, who won from NA-249, said that Karachi is still an MQM stronghold and no other party, even the PTI, can change that.

news@khaleejtimes.com