Islamabad - Frontline parties in Pakistan's ruling coalition scored a majority in this week's by-elections, which were overshadowed by a pending court ruling on the candidacy of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif for a National Assembly seat.

Thursday's ballots to fill five National Assembly and 23 provincial assembly seats were marked by low turnouts and a few clashes between political opponents that injured at least two dozen people.

According to the results posted on the Election Commission website on Friday, Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) won three National Assembly and eight provincial assembly seats, nearly all in the rich and powerful Punjab province, home to more than half of Pakistan's 160 million population.

The Pakistan People's Party (PPP) of slain ex-premier Benazir Bhutto emerged as the runner-up, with its candidates winning two National and seven provincial assembly seats.

The rest of the winners were either from smaller parties or contested elections as independent candidates.

A by-election in a ward of the Punjab capital Lahore was put off by the Supreme Court on Wednesday after the federal government challenged Sharif's disqualification over his previous convictions.

The two-time former prime minister was convicted of terrorism charges after his abortive attempt in 1999 to sack President Pervez Musharraf, the then military chief. Musharraf ousted Sharif in a bloodless coup and sent him into exile to Saudi Arabia in 2000 after granting him a controversial pardon.

Sharif returned a few weeks before the February 18 elections, which saw a comprehensive defeat of Musharraf's political allies. His party formed a coalition government with PPP as the leading partner.

But the relations between Sharif and Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto's widower who now leads the PPP, have soured over the mechanics of the promised reinstatement of judges, and the future of the embattled president.

Demanding immediate reinstatement of judges and ouster of Musharraf through impeachment in parliament, the former prime minister has seen his popularity graph rising sharply.

An opinion poll released last week by two Washington-based think- tanks, New America Foundation and Terror Free Tomorrow, showed that Sharif has seen a steady rise in his popularity, from 57 per cent favourable in the August 2007 poll, to 74 per cent in January 2008 and 86 per cent now.

"I am very grateful to my God, public, voters and well-wishers for the success my party gained in the by-elections," he told reporters on Friday. (dpa)