ECP issues list of new delimitations ahead of polls

F.P. Report
ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has issued preliminary list of new delimitations ahead of general polls. The chief election commissioner (CEC) and ECP members approved the preliminary list of new delimitations under the 2023 digital census data.
After CEC’s approval, the commission issued the initial list of the delimitations on its website. Yesterday, the delimitation process of for the national and provincial assemblies entered its final phase and the ECP decided to approve initial delimitations. For the National Assembly (NA), the voter quota for Punjab province was fixed at 905,595, 913,000 for Sindh, 907,913 for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), 930,900 for Balochistan and 787,954 for Islamabad.
The voter quota for the Punjab Assembly will be 429,929, 428,431 for the Sindh Assembly, 355,270 for the KP Assembly and 292,047 for the Balochistan Assembly. The election commission will address the objections from October 28 to November 26, whereas, the objections could be filed against the delimitations from September 27 to October 26.
The hearing on the pleas against the delimitations will be conducted till November 25. The ECP will unveil the final delimitations on November 30. After the publication of the final delimitations, a 54-day election schedule will be announced and general polls will be held in the first week of January 2024.
Based on the initial delimitation, the population distribution in the National Assembly constituencies is as follows: Balochistan has 930,900 voters, followed by 913,052 voters in Sindh, 907,913 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 905,595 in Punjab, and 787,954 in Islamabad.
The National Assembly consists of 266 general seats and 60 seats reserved for women. Ten seats have also been reserved for non-Muslims. Punjab holds the majority of 141 seats in NA, followed by Sindh with 61, KP with 45, Balochistan with 16, and Islamabad with 3.
In the provincial assembly constituencies, the figures show Punjab leads with a total population of 429,929, followed by Sindh with 428,432, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 355,270, and Balochistan with 292,047. As per the delimitation report, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com, the share of seats in the national and provincial assemblies have been worked out on the basis of the final results of the 2023 census.
“The population of the province/area has been divided by the total number of general seats and the average population or quota per National Assembly seat was obtained. Similarly, the population of a province was divided by the total number of general seats allocated to the provincial assembly to obtain a quota per seat. “In calculating the total number of seats, a fraction of 0.5 and above was generally taken as one seat and a fraction below 0.5 was ignored. Due to the peculiar situation in Balochistan, more than one district has been clubbed. Similarly, few clubbings have also been made in other provinces where necessary,” it said.