Election fever is on rise in Rawalpindi with rivals flexing their political muscles and diligently wooing voters to win their maximum support. Including a former minister who has won all previous electoral battles, a veteran politician and some new entrants into national level politics, are going to give each other a tough time.
Hot contest is expected on two national assembly seats (NA-55 and NA-56) on January 8 with canvassing gaining momentum and likely surge after Saturday's lifting of emergency by President Pervez Musharraf.
Sheikh Rashid Ahmed is to face Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz's Javed Hashmi and Pakistan People's Party's Amir Fida Piracha in NA-55, while his traditional hold on the city politics is being challenged in NA-56 by Hanif Abbasi of PML-N and Sardar Shaukat Hayat of PPP.
Javed Hashmi, who spent over four years in Rawalpindi's central Adiala Jail, and Fida are new to contest National Assembly election from Rawalpindi. Sheikh Rashid has the advantage of being victor in six consecutive elections from the city, where he is popularly known as Farzand or son of Rawalpindi. But Piracha vowed that things had changed a lot. "I am very hopeful I will win with a clear majority with the support of the people."
In NA-55 there are 334,111 registered voters with 183,405 male and 150,706 female, whereas NA-56 has 311,999 voters including 167,947 male and 144,052 female.
These two constituencies mainly comprise Chaudhry, Rajas, Maliks, Shaikhs, Kashmiris and other communities most of whom settled here when Islamabad became federal capital in 1960.
Interestingly, more than ten languages are spoken in the area due to settlement of job seekers, who settled in Rawalpindi. Rashid emerged with a bang on the political scenario when he defeated strong rival and a former mayor of Rawalpindi Shaikh Ghulam Hussain in 1985 Elections.
He continued his winning streak in 1988 Elections by defeating PPP General Secretary General Tikka Khan (Retd), one of the most important figures of his party. The opponents of Javed Hashmi claim that he is not well versed with the voting trends in the constituency due to variety of castes and clans. But PML-N supporters plead that most of the voters here cast their votes on the basis of ideology.
After acceptance of his nomination papers by the returning officer, Javed Hashmi had told media persons that in presence of viable PML-N candidate, Sheikh Rashid Ahmad would now not be able to grab his party's vote bank like the previous general elections.
PPP's Amir Fida Piracha who won provincial assembly seat in 2002 Elections, was awarded party ticket in recognition of his family's longstanding services for the party.
His elder brother Anjum Farooq Piracha, who got paralysed in a firing incident during an election campaign was also a member of the provincial assembly. Though Piracha is quite young, yet his family enjoys political influence besides having a traditional PPP vote bank that is believed to be still intact.
When contacted Sheikh Rashid said he was quite confident that voters would again repose confidence in his leadership and he would emerge victorious from both NA constituencies. "I hope JI voters will also cast votes in my favour. Election battle has started and people will know the ground reality very soon," he said.
Supporters of Sheikh Rashid claim, despite PML-N's fielding its own candidate, most of the union council Nazims and councillors would hopefully support Rashid in the forthcoming elections.
It is expected that floating vote bank that seem to be still undecided would play an important role in deciding the fate of all these candidates. Jamat-i-Islami has also a vote bank in this constituency and in absence of its own candidate, it would be quite interesting who would be able to get sympathies of JI voters if they cast their votes in the elections.
In NA-56 former MNA Hanif Abbasi who had defeated Sheikh Rashid's nephew in 2002 by-election, is running on PML-N ticket in the elections. He can hopefully enjoy the support of JI voters. "I will get more than 80,000 votes from this constituency," Abbasi said. "Earlier, I defeated Rashid's nephew and this time I shall secure seat again."
PPP's Sardar Shaukat Hayat has also embarked upon an intensive election campaign mainly depending upon the traditional PPP vote bank in the constituency. JI former MPA from this constituency Fayyazul Hassan Chohan also left his party, so it is quite interesting that both JI members elected on national and provincial assemblies seats switched over to other parties.
As lawyers community representative, Ali Ahmed Kurd is already out of contest, the make and break situation is foreseen till the polling day when people would decide the fate of these contestants.
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