ISLAMABAD  -  Since a large number of inde­pendent candidates backed by PTI are constitutionally not able to get reserved seats, the top electoral watchdog has made it clear that it would not allocate reserved seats to po­litical parties without election symbols.

The top election regulatory body, in its statement issued here on Tuesday, stated that the reserved seats will be allo­cated to women and minorities in accordance with the Election Act of 2017. The political par­ties will get share as per pro­portion of secured seats.

The independent candidates backed by PTI have recently agreed to join the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) in both the Cen­tre and in provinces. The party has also planned to collaborate with the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) in KP to achieve its reserved seats in the National Assembly.

Political pundits viewed that a large number of indepen­dent candidates have secured seats in the country’s political history. Majority of these inde­pendent candidates have as­sociation with PTI but they contested in the elections as in­dependent. These PTI-backed candidates have got 90 National Assembly seats, followed by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which have 75 and 54 seats, respectively.