AJK elections: PML-N grabs 9 out of 13 seats across Mirpur division, unofficial results show

Unofficial results from the first phase of Azad Jammu and Kashmir's staggered elections show the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) winning nine of the thirteen seats contested across Mirpur division, with the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) taking the remaining four, according to counts compiled after polling closed.

District-by-district breakdown

In Mirpur district itself, PML-N won the Dadyal and Khari Sharif constituencies, while PPP secured Mirpur city and Chakswari. Bhimber district went almost entirely to PML-N, which took Barnala, Samahni, and Bhimber, with no seats reported for PPP there. Kotli district was more competitive: PML-N won Nakyal, Sehnsa, Charhoi, and Khuiratta, while PPP claimed two seats, LA-8 and LA-10.

The closest and widest margins

The tightest contest of the round came in LA-5 (Barnala), where PML-N's Waqar Ahmed Noor narrowly defeated PPP's Chaudhry Parvaiz Ashraf by fewer than 700 votes — 30,259 to 29,574. At the other extreme, PML-N's Tariq Farooq won LA-7 (Bhimber-III) decisively with 38,340 votes, one of the largest margins recorded in the phase.

Polling in LA-9 (Nakyal) was marked by unrest, though PML-N's Umair Naeem ultimately prevailed there once counting was completed.

Political context and reactions

This was the first of a three-phased election process in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, held amid heightened security and against a backdrop of protests from the Joint Awami Action Committee, which has been demanding the abolition of the region's reserved refugee seats — a long-running point of contention in AJK's electoral system.

PML-N leader Rana Sanaullah described the elections as having been conducted in a "peaceful, free and credible manner," characterizing most of the reported incidents, including the disturbance in Nakyal, as isolated rather than indicative of systemic problems with the process.

With two more phases still to be held across the remaining divisions, Mirpur's results give PML-N an early lead heading into the rest of the vote, though the final composition of the AJK legislature will depend heavily on how the later phases play out in divisions where the party's traditional strength has varied more than it did in this round.

What comes next

Election officials are expected to formalize Mirpur's results once postal and provisional ballots are reconciled, a process that in past AJK elections has occasionally produced small shifts in razor-thin contests like LA-5. Attention now turns to the second and third phases, covering the remaining divisions of the territory, where opposition parties will be looking to narrow PML-N's early lead and where the Joint Awami Action Committee's objections over refugee seat allocations are likely to remain a live political issue regardless of how the overall seat count ultimately shakes out.

Security arrangements around the remaining phases are also expected to draw scrutiny given the unrest reported during polling in Nakyal. Local administrations in the divisions still to vote have indicated they will deploy additional personnel at sensitive polling stations, a response to concerns raised by multiple parties, including PML-N itself, that isolated incidents during the first phase not be allowed to recur at a larger scale as the remaining two phases unfold across the rest of the territory.

Turnout figures from Mirpur division, once finalized, will also be closely watched as an early indicator of overall voter engagement in this election cycle, particularly given the backdrop of political tension surrounding the refugee-seat dispute and the broader security concerns that have accompanied the run-up to polling across Azad Jammu and Kashmir this year.