LAHORE - According to unofficial results, PML-N candidate Babar Anwar won the race for the National Assembly seat from Haripur's NA-19 constituency, with Dr Raja Amir Zaman of the PTI coming in at second place.
Voting for the by-election ended peacefully at 5pm Sunday with no reported disruptions. As per consolidated unofficial results from all polling stations, Babar Anwar bagged 116,624 votes while Zaman secured 78,512 votes.
As many as nine candidates are contesting for NA membership from the constituency, but the real contest is between Babar and Dr Zaman.
The by-election garnered attention after it was announced that biometric machines will be tested at 30 polling stations. An official of the Election Commission of Pakistan said that biometric machines would be used to authenticate voters before issuing ballot papers at polling stations as part of a pilot project.
He said the success of biometric machines would determine if it was viable to spend billions on introducing the device in the next general election.
The official said the National Database and Registration Auth­ority (Nadra), Pakistan Tele­communi­cation Authority (PTA) and a cellular network provider (Ufone) would render technical assistance in this regard. The pilot project, he added, was in line with suggestions of political parties as had been conveyed by the Electoral Reforms Committee of Parliament.
To ensure a peaceful environment during polling, soldiers of the Pakistan Army had also been stationed in the constituency in addition to policemen, while the local administration had imposed section 144 to ban exhibition of weapons.