In the general elections of 8 February 2024 (GE-2024), none of the three contested National Assembly (NA) constituencies in the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) returned a result where the number of rejected ballots exceeded the margin of victory between the winning candidate and the runner-up. ICT is the only region in the five-election dataset — covering GE-2002, GE-2008, GE-2013, GE-2018, and GE-2024 — to record zero such constituencies in GE-2024.
What the Numbers Show
Across the five-election series, ICT has recorded this condition in only one election: GE-2008, when one of three ICT NA constituencies returned a result where rejected ballots exceeded the winning margin — representing 33.3 percent of ICT’s NA seats in that election. In GE-2002, GE-2013, GE-2018, and GE-2024, no ICT NA constituency recorded this condition. Every other region in the dataset — Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — recorded at least one such constituency in GE-2024. ICT’s clean record in the most recent election, combined with its single recorded instance across the entire series, distinguishes it from all other regions in the dataset.
What the Numbers Do Not Establish
The absence of any such constituency in GE-2024 does not establish that the conditions which produced the GE-2008 instance have been permanently resolved, nor does it indicate that rejected ballots were negligible in absolute terms across ICT’s three constituencies. The one constituency from GE-2008 nonetheless warrants documentation — of the grounds on which ballots were rejected, the polling stations with the highest rejection counts, and whether the rejection rate fell within the normal range for that constituency. The ECP may use its powers under Section 8(b) of the Elections Act, 2017 to conduct such an exercise for historical completeness, and to inform its voter education frameworks ahead of future elections. FAFEN’s constituency-level data series, drawing on Form 49 records, will include this constituency in its documentation.
What Is the Margin of Victory?
The margin of victory is the numerical difference between the votes secured by the winning candidate and the votes secured by the candidate who finished second. It is the gap that separates a seat won from a seat lost. In closely contested constituencies, this margin may be a few hundred — or even a few dozen — votes.
What Are Rejected Ballots?
A rejected ballot is a ballot paper excluded from the vote count. Polling staff identify and set aside such ballots during the counting process at the polling station. The Returning Officer (RO) then reviews these determinations during the consolidation of results, and the ballot is formally rejected only after that scrutiny. Pakistani electoral procedure specifies four grounds for rejection: the ballot does not bear the presiding officer’s official stamp and signature; it carries any mark or writing beyond the Assistant Presiding Officer’s (APO) official seal and signature; an extraneous paper or material is attached to it; or the voting mark falls simultaneously in the boxes of two candidates in a way that makes it impossible to determine which candidate the voter intended to select.
Rejection does not automatically indicate fraud or deliberate misconduct. Voter error — including accidental double-marking or stamps placed outside the designated box — accounts for a documented share of rejections in every election.
