Caretaker Sindh Chief Minister Justice (r) Maqbool Baqar presiding over a meeting to review the arrangements for the upcoming February 8th election directed the administration to enforce a code of conduct and provide all necessary facilities to ensure free, fair, transparent, and peaceful polling.
He instructed the administration to carry out a mock exercise to ensure the fool proof retrieval of the election material. “This exercise must be carried out in the mock security of the police, Rangers and the army.”
The meeting was held at the Commissioner’s Office. It was attended by Minister Information Ahmad Shah, Chief Secretary Dr Fakhre Alam, IG Police Riffat Mukhtar, Commissioner Waheed Shaikh, DIG Nasir Aftab, Deputy Commissioner Larkana Dr Sharjeel Channa, and other concerned officers. 16,704 policemen, 2,552 army personnel, 133 QRF to be deployed for security of 2738 polling stations.
Commissioner Larkano Waheed Shaikh and DIG Nasir Aftab gave a detailed briefing to the caretaker chief minister. Larkana division comprises five districts, namely Larkano, Kamber-Shahdadkot, Shikarpur, Jacobabd, and Sukkur. The division has a total of 3,592,271 registered voters, including 1,930,896 males and 1,661,375 females.
There are eight national and 17 provincial assembly seats in the division. A total of 95 candidates, including four females, are contesting for the national assembly election. Furthermore, there are 236 candidates, including 10 females, who are competing for the 17 provincial assembly seats. The districts of Larkano and Kambar-Shahdadkot each have two national and four provincial assembly seats. Shikarpur has two national and three provincial assembly seats. Jacobabad and Kashmore each have one national and three provincial assembly seats.
In total, there will be 2738 polling stations in the division, out of which 1306 are normal, 619 are sensitive, 813 are highly sensitive, and 55 are improvised.