Some of the infamous Pakistani extremist leaders, accused of spreading religious hatred and instigating sectarian violence, are among hundreds of candidates contesting the July 25 elections, amid concerns that their possible entry into parliament could further radicalise the society.
The leading among them are Mumbai-terror attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed-led banned Jamat-ud Dawah's candidates who are fighting with an aim to make Pakistan a "citadel of Islam."
The JuD, a front for the Lashkar-e-Taiba terror group that carried out the deadly 2008 Mumbai attack, launched its political wing Milli Muslim League (MML) to contest the elections. However, it fielded its candidates from the platform of little known political entity Allaha-u-Akbar Tehreek (AAT) after the election commission denied registration of the MML as a political party.
The JuD, declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the US in June 2014, has fielded 80 candidates for the National Assembly that includes Hafiz Saeed's son Hafiz Talha Saeed and son-in-law Hafiz Khalid Waleed.
Senior JuD leader Qari Muhammad Sheikh Yaqoob, a member of LeT's central advisory committee who is on the US-designate terror list, is also running for a seat in parliament from Lahore.
Another extremist sectarian outfit Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ), which was banned in Pakistan till last month, has fielded dozens of candidates including one of its top leaders, Aurangzeb Farooqi, who is on Pakistan's terrorism watch list.
Farooqi's outfit ASWJ that incites hatred and violence against minority Shia community is widely believed to be the political front for Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, an even deadlier sectarian militant group with ties to Al Qaeda, according to the New York Times.
In the 2013 general elections, Farooqi had lost with a margin of 202 votes.
His group has even extended its support to former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi in the elections after the veteran PML-N leader visited its local office in Islamabad and sought electoral support.
"Why are these terrorists now allowed to become our parliamentarians?" the NYT quoted 20-year-old university student Asad Gokal as saying in Karachi.
Last month, Pakistan government lifted a ban on the ASWJ and unblocked assets of its chief Maulana Ahmed Ludhianvi, in a surprise decision hours before the country was placed on the 'grey list' by the Financial Action Task Force for failing to curb anti-terror financing.
Omar Shahid Hamid, a senior police superintendent for Karachi's southern district who used to conduct regular check-ins with Farooqi as a member of the police counterterrorism unit, said he was surprised that Farooqi's nomination papers were not rejected, the NYT reported.
The ASWJ has even formed an influential alliance with the jailed prime minister Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf to take on its rival political parties, especially the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), in its stronghold of Malir in Sindh.
The Tehreek-i-Labbaik (TLP) Pakistan is another hardline Islamic party led by radical cleric Khadim Hussain Rizvi, who says his party's manifesto is same as that of Islam's teachings to create a truly Islamic welfare state in Pakistan.
The party has fielded candidates on all the national assembly and provincial assembly seats from Karachi.
The little known TLP came into prominence in November last year when its followers led by Rizvi converged at Islamabad and Rawalpindi and staged a sit-in demanding sacking of the then law minister and strict action against those behind an amendment to the Khatm-e-Nabuwwat oath in the Elections Act 2017.
The law minister was forced to resign after violent clashes broke out between the TLP supporters and security forces which had left several people dead and hundreds injured in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.
The amendment was later deemed a clerical error' and was rectified by the PML-N government which restored the Khatm-e-Nabuwat declaration to its original form.
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