The 1977 Election
Background
Under the 1973 constitution, the term of National Assembly was to expire on august 14, 1977 and general elections were to be held by that date. The 1973 Constitution was enforced on August 14, 1973, which entitled the National Assembly elected in December 1970 and began to function in January 1972, to continue functioning for five years from the date of enforcement of the 1973 Constitution. However, on demand of opposition parties, the then Prime Minister Z.A Bhutto in his final address to national assembly on January 7, 1977, announced the date of general elections to be held on 7 March 1977. Similarly, the four provincial assemblies were dissolved on January 13, 1977 and elections in provincial assemblies were scheduled for March 10, 1977.
For 1977 elections, fresh electoral roll was prepared and delimitation of constituencies was held. Article 51(1) of the new constitution raised the number of general seats in the National Assembly from 138 to 200. Similarly, article 51(3) stated that these seats would be allocated to the provinces, FATA, and the federal capital based on population in accordance with the officially published census. Pakistan‟s total population as recorded in the 1972 census was 64,980,371 and therefore every seat covered the population of 324,902 persons. Further, clause 4 of article 51 provided for the allocation of ten reserved seats for women to be distributed among the provinces. Similarly, article 51(2A) amended in fourth constitutional amendment provided for six seats reserved for minorities such as Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Parses and Qadianis. Therefore, total strength at the time of the general elections in1977 was 216.
The Contending Parties
In 1977 elections, the major elections contenders were the ruling party, the PPP, and alliance of mainly the right wing political parties called as Pakistan National Alliance (PNA). On the one side, PPP was contesting the election to hold on to power and its key leaders were confident that they could win the election based on their performance. On the other side, PNA comprised of nine political parties such as the Tehrik-i-Istiqlal (TI), Jamaat-i-Islami (JI), Jamiatul Ulema-e-Islam Mufti (JUI), Jamiat-e-Ulema-e- Pakistan (JUP), Pakistan Muslim League Pagaro Group (PML-Pagaro), National Democratic Party (NDP), Pakistan Democratic Party (PDP), Khaksar Tehrik (KT), and Azad Kashmir Muslim Conference (AKMC). In this way, right wing conservative and Islamic parties dominated the PNA. Further, the PML-Qayyum contested elections separately. In the elections, there participated a number of small political parties specific to pro