All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) Punjab Zone elections for the year 2004-05 have become controversial after boycott by one of the groups against violation of election by-laws.
Adil Mahmood of Adil Textile mills, who was in the run for the office of chairman, withdrew his candidature in protest against election procedure before the start of polling.
Akbar Shaikh of North Star Textile Mills Ltd, who was in the run for senior vice-chairman, boycotted after the start of polling held at Aptma House.
"These are illegal elections based on illegal process and mala fide intentions, said Adil Mahmood and Akbar Shaikh at a press conference here on Thursday.
However, Returning Officer Pervaiz Malik MNA while announcing the election results declared Tariq Mahmood of Pak-Kuwait Textile Mills and Danish Monnoo of Lahore Textile and General Mills Limited as Chairman and Senior Vice-Chairman respectively of Aptma, Punjab Zone, for 2004-05. He said that despite withdrawal Adil Mahmood got 35 votes and Akbar Shaikh secured 37 votes.
The winning candidates Tariq Mahmood and Danish Monnoo got 74 and 75 votes, respectively.
Arif Saeed (90 votes), Khurshid Monnoo (81), Wasal Monnoo (74), Javaid Siddique (73), Mian Muhammad Jahangir (69) and Zahid Anwar (61) have been elected members of Central Managing Committee.
Pervaiz Malik said that according to final list of candidates, the total number of eligible candidates were 174 out of which 112 voters used their franchised rights.
He said that rules of the association were not violated during the election process and dues were received within stipulated period.
Adil Mahmood and Akbar Shaikh in their joint press conference expressed dissatisfaction over the election process and levelled allegations of pre-election-rigging against their opponents.
They said that they were not provided final list of voters and their voters were not allowed to cast votes by raising objections. One of our voters was not allowed to cast votes, by saying that he has yet to pay one rupee to Aptma, they added.
Aptma members who were out of the country were provided the facility of changing their voter's name to the ruling group, but this facility was not provided to our group", they added.
To a question, they said that they will chalk out future strategy in consultation with elders of Aptma, but ruled out any possibility of approaching the court of law. Nevertheless, we are Aptma members and interests of textile community are more important than the personal interest, they maintained.
Earlier, polling was started at Aptma House on Thursday but situation turned unpleasant when an objection was raised by a polling agent of ruling group about eligibility of one voter.
At 11:50 am returning officer Pervaiz Malik received a fax message from Akbar Shaikh intimating that he has decided to withdraw from the voting process, which is illegal, and violation of Aptma by-laws.
On the other hand, Mian Jahangir Monnoo former Chairman Aptma while talking to reporters at Aptma House Lahore rebutted the allegations of pre-poll rigging. He said that the defeated group did not have the support of majority. Arif Saeed Chairman Aptma Punjab Zone and Anjum.M.Salim former Chairman Aptma said that whole election process was transparent.
Some impartial textile industrialists said that division in Aptma members is not a good sign for the future of the association, which is one of the biggest business organisations in the country.
They said that these differences might appear in the elections of Central Chairman of Aptma, being held in next few weeks.