• By Abhirupa Kundu
  • Thu, 08 Feb 2024 01:08 PM (IST)
  • Source:JND
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Pakistan Election 2024 Live Updates: Voting for the Pakistan general elections began on Thursday at 90,000 polling booths across the country amid tight security. The voting began at 8:00 am local time and will end at 5:00 pm. Minutes before the polling began for the general elections, mobile internet services were temporarily suspended across the country. According to the country's interior minister, the step was taken due to the recent surge in terrorist activities.

The key candidates in the fray include Nawaz Sharif contesting from Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), ousted former prime minister Imran Khan from Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari from Pakistan People's Party (PPP). Apart from this, more than 17,000 candidates are contesting to form a new government in the political turmoil-hit country.

Pakistan Parliamentary Elections 2024 LIVE Updates:

-Mobile internet services were temporarily suspended for the day in Pakistan as voting began to elect 266 candidates to the Pakistan National Assembly, Dawn reported. Meanwhile, The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has said that internet services will remain functional on Thursday and that it had not yet received any instructions from the government to shut internet. 

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- Four policemen on election duty killed in terror attack in northwest Pakistan, media reports claimed. 

- Nawaz Sharif, former Pakistan prime minister casts vote in Lahore. He is most likely to return to power for the fourth time. 

 

- Pakistan Muslim League (N) (PML-N) chief Shehbaz Sharif cast his vote in Lahore's NA128 Model Town constituency, Dawn reported.

- Pakistan has announced the closure of its borders with neighbouring Afghanistan and Iran to ensure security during the upcoming general elections slated for February 8, as per Dawn. The decision, disclosed by Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch on Wednesday, aims to maintain stability during the polling process.

- PTI chief Imran Khan on Thursday cast his vote for the general elections by a postal ballot from Adiala Jail, local media reported. However, Khan's wife, Bushra Bibi, could not vote as she was convicted and arrested after the completion of the postal voting process.

- Nawaz Sharif who is the front runner of the national elections, is looking forward to secure victory and reign for the fourth term as the prime minister in Pakistan. The 74-year-old recently returned from exile and his party is tipped to emerge as the single largest party in the elections.

- One security personnel was killed in an attack on a security forces vehicle in Pakistan's Dera Ismail Khan. Assailants attacked the vehicle which was on election duty, Samaa TV reported citing sources. The incident took place in the Kot Azam areaon the day when voting for national and state assemblies were underway, Samaa TV reported.

- Former Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria has said the Pakistan general elections are the most predictable, the most rigged. "These elections on February 8 are not just the most predictable, but also the most rigged, because it's clear for everyone in Pakistan, if you see the commentary that is coming from within Pakistan, that the election results are clear, that the army in various ways is doing pre-election engineering, it will probably do some election engineering and post-election engineering to get a government that it wants in place," Bisaria said.

-Pakistan-based National Democratic Movement (NDM) Chairman Mohsin Dawar highlighted that three female polling agents in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's Tappi have been attacked by the Taliban during the ongoing general elections.