Pak national’s poll nomination rejected

A Pakistani national, who was in the fray for the Jammu-Poonch Lok Sabha seat as a Samajwadi Janata Party candidate, was thrown out of the electoral battle when Returning Officer Naveen Choudhary today rejected his nomination papers on grounds of disputed nationality and deletion of name from the voters’ list.

Sources said that SJP candidate Zulfikar Ali of Salwa (Poonch) was also absconding from police in connection with an attempt to murder case. Rejecting his nomination papers, the Returning Officer held that his nationality was disputed as he himself had gone to court for settling the issue. Moreover, his name was not included in the current electoral rolls, he pointed out.

Significantly, Zulfikar’s papers along with those of 26 other candidates were found to be in order during scrutiny on April 2 as he had furnished his name in the electoral rolls of 1995.

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Zulfikar’s family had come to India in 1983. They remained in India after filing a court case pleading that they not be deported as they had migrated to Pakistan during the 1965 war to save their lives.

In 1990, the court ruled that they cannot claim to be Indian citizens. Despite the verdict, the family remained in the village and got their names included in the voters’s list. One of Zulfikar’s relatives was also recruited by police during 1996-97.