Comprising seven tehsils of Murree, Rawalpindi, Taxila, Gujjar Khan, Kahuta, Kotli Sattian and Kallar Syedan, Rawalpindi district has seven National Assembly and 14 provincial assembly seats. Both former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf and former opposition leader in the National Assembly Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan belong to this district, as do prominent politicians including Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, Raja Zafarul Haq, Syed Zafar Ali Shah, Basharat Raja and Ghulam Sarwar Khan.

The biradri (clan) factor has a very little role to play in the politics here. The Abbasis and the Sattis dominate electoral politics in Murree and the other hilly areas; the Rajputs, Gujjars, Kashmiris, Arains and Kiyanis are also politically active, scattered through the Rawalpindi and Gujjar Khan tehsils. The Rajput Chaudhrys of Alpial, the Rajgans of Dhamial and the Khattars have been dominating electoral politics in the rural areas of Rawalpindi and Taxila.

The district has always been a Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz stronghold with the party making a clean sweep in the 1990, 1993 and 1997 elections. In the last elections, the party took six National Assembly and nine provincial assembly seats in the district. The PML-N lost only one seat to the Pakistan Peoples Party’s Raja Pervez Ashraf and that too because of the clear division of the anti-PPP votes. This was the only seat the PPP secured from the district.

The only time the PML-N suffered a blow in this northern district was in 2002, when the party leadership was in exile and it managed to secure just one seat: Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan won on NA-52.

For the upcoming polls, the PML-N has retained all its previous candidates for the National Assembly seats, except for NA-51 (Gujjar Khan) where the party has awarded a ticket to Raja Javed Ikhlas, a former ally of retired Gen Pervez Musharraf; the decision has caused a serious rift within the party.

Now, the PML-N is facing a changed scenario given the PPP-PML-Q alliance and the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) factor. Imran Khan is contesting against Hanif Abbasi on NA-56, which the PML-N has never lost.

Chaudhry Nisar, who is contesting on NA-52 and NA-53 and PP-6 and PP-7, has the unique record of winning the previous seven elections. However, he is contesting for PP-6 as an independent candidate because of the party leadership’s late decision over the award of the ticket here.

In NA-50, the main contest is once again between the two arch-rivals, the PML-N’s Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and the PPP’s Ghulam Murtaza Satti. Mr Abbasi had been winning this seat since 1988 but was defeated in 2002. Mr Satti’s victory, however, was because the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal had also fielded a candidate from the Abbasi biradri and the votes were divided. Mr Abbasi regained his seat in the 2008 elections. The PPP candidate is hopeful now, though, because the PTI has awarded a ticket to Sadaqat Ali Abbasi.

In NA-52, the PML-N’s Chaudhry Nisar is facing Basharat Raja, a close confidante of the Chaudhrys of Gujrat, as a joint PPP-PML-Q candidate whereas in NA-53 his rival is again Ghulam Sarwar Khan, this time contesting on the PTI ticket.

Chaudhry Nisar easily won the NA-52 seat in previous elections while he was defeated by Ghulam Sarwar Khan in NA-53 after a tough match in the 2002 elections. Ghulam Sarwar contested the 2002 elections independently after returning his PPP ticket and later joined the PML-Q. In 2008, Ghulam Sarwar contested on the PML-Q ticket but faced defeat at the hands of Chaudhry Nisar.

In NA-54, the PML-N has awarded its ticket again to former MNA Malik Abrar who will be facing the PPP’s Zamarrud Khan. This is the constituency where the GHQ is located and a large number of serving and retired military men live here. Previously Ijazul Haq, son of the military dictator Ziaul Haq, has won this seat.

The densely populated and entirely urban NA-55 and NA-56 constituencies were won by the PML-N in the 2008 elections. In 2002, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed won the two seats as an independent candidate but it is said that he exploited his past association with the PML-N during the campaign. After winning the two seats, he joined the PML-Q. The people did not like Sheikh Rashid’s somersault and took revenge by first rejecting his nephew in the by-elections and later in the 2008 elections, giving him a humiliating defeat in both constituencies at the hands of the PML-N candidates.

Sheikh Rashid is contesting the May 11 elections only from the NA-55 constituency under a new arrangement with the PTI. The PTI has decided not to field any candidate in NA-55 and in return Sheikh Rashid will support Imran Khan in NA-56.