Delimitation of constituencies: IHC turns down 23 petitions

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday turned down 23 petitions against delimitation of constituencies from different districts all over Pakistan while nullified the delimitation of district Kharan.
A single bench of IHC comprising Justice Aamer Farooq was hearing these petitions and maintained the Election Commission of Pakistan's (ECP) notification about delimitations while rejecting these 23 petitions. The IHC bench allowed only one petition to the extent of district Kharan in Balochistan as same IHC bench had earlier set aside the delimitation of this district and this was one another petition from the same district.
The bench reserved its order in the petition challenging delimitation of district Abbottabad.
During the hearing, Justice Aamer remarked that the court would not allow any delay in the general election. It directed all the petitioners to appear before the ECP on June 4.
All the 23 petitions which were dismissed were challenging the delimitations of 10 constituencies of districts Bhakkar, Batgram, Karachi, Islamabad, Layyah, Mandi Bahauddin, Mirpur Khas and Sargodha.
The court rejected the petitions after hearing arguments of the petitioners and the ECP as well. The same IHC bench would now hear the petitions challenging delimitation of 8 constituencies on Friday (today).
This bench had set aside the delimitation of six constituencies of districts Bahawalpur, Kharan, Ghotki, Sheikhupura, Haripur and Kasur as null and void on May 30 and sent these cases back to the ECP for rehearing in the matters while IHC bench had upheld ECP's delimitation decision regarding Chiniot, Khanewal, Gujranwala, Umerkot, Sialkot, Jacobabad, Rahimyar Khan, Chakwal, Bannu, Kurrum Agency, Swabi, Mansehra and Rajanpur districts and rejected petitions against these.
On May 29, the IHC bench had nullified the delimitations of four districts including Toba Tek Singh, Lower Dir, Jhang and Jhelum and remanded back these cases to ECP for re-adjudication.
Many of the political parties including the three major parties, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and Pakistan Peoples Party, through 108 petitions had challenged the new delimitations.
The petitioners adopted before the court that the poll-supervisory body has done delimitation on political grounds and these should be set aside as standard procedure was not followed in the delimitation of the constituencies.