As many as 300 people have obtained application forms for the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) tickets to contest elections to Provincial and National Assemblies from Lahore The Express Tribune has learnt.
There are 13 National Assembly and 25 Provincial Assembly constituencies in the city. Central Information Secretary Shafqat Mehmood said in view of the overwhelming response the party has extended the dates for issuance and submission of applications.
An advertisement carried by the party earlier had asked the candidates to get forms from designated offices by March 7 and submit them by March 9. The forms cost Rs3,000 each and the submission fee is Rs17,000 for the Provincial Assembly seats and Rs27,000 for the National Assembly seats, Mehmood said.
Candidates younger than 35 years can pay Rs7,000 for a ticket to either assembly.
Mehmood said the response was overwhelming. He said no more than 25 applications would be issued for a provincial constituency. The minimum number of forms received so far for a constituency was five candidates.
The last date for obtaining nomination forms has now been extended to March 13 and the last date to submit these forms at designated offices or TCS outlets is March 15. As many as 23 TCS outlets were designated initially for this purpose, the central information secretary added.
Later three more centres were added in Abbotabad, Bannu and Sargodha, Mehmood said.
Omer Zaheer Meer, a senior PTI leader, said district organisation would scrutinise the applications and recommend four candidates from each constituency to the party’s provincial parliamentary board. The board would then forward these names and its recommendations to the Central Parliamentary Board, he said.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 9th, 2013.