Election watchdogs today vowed to scrutinise every single postal ballot application after one in ten people in one ward have asked for them.

The pledge comes amid growing claims that some voters had been pressurised into applying for postal votes by political activists.

Police and election chiefs have already launched investigations into the claims and are warning ballot-rigging will be dealt with severely.

Bradford's returning officer Ian Stewart, who is also the Council's chief executive, has heard rumours that unscrupulous political activists put pressure on electors to hand over the forms.

And today Mr Stewart said his team of scrutineers would pay special attention to the applications to ensure they are genuine - with police pledging to use forensic tests on any forms not thought to be genuine.

Concern has been raised over Bradford Moor where more than 1,000 people have applied for the forms out of a total of 11,000 people entitled to vote.

And as the applications were being counted and keyed into computers at the election unit today it emerged that applications at Toller and University wards in the volatile Bradford West constituency are likely to be just as high.

By this afternoon about 3,800 applications had been processed for the whole of Bradford West, where 71,620 people are entitled to vote.

In Bradford North, which has 66,454 voters, there were approximately 3,600 applications.

About 2,380 people wanted to vote by post in Bradford South, where 68,450 people are on the electoral roll.

The marginal constituencies of Shipley and Keighley each had about 3,200 applications.

Across the whole of the Bradford district at least 17,000 people have asked for the forms out of 334,500 potential voters.

The Council's election unit telephones have been jammed for two days as the number of people wanting application forms more than doubled from about 7,000 in the last election.

It follows the lifting of Government restrictions which means anyone can now vote by post and is part of a drive to get more people balloting. Voting slips will be sent out tomorrow to individual addresses.

But one senior politician in the district, who asked not to be named, warned that the system was open to wide-scale abuse.

"The whole postal vote situation is wrong in a district like Bradford. It might be all right for an old lady in rural Bingley but in the inner city I have heard of threats and it is a dangerous system," he said.

Mr Stewart has already held talks with police over the reports of threats to make people get postal votes and then hand them over.

He said today: "We will be looking very closely at each and every postal vote."

And Chief Superintendent Dave Richardson said officers were investigating reports about postal votes and any other electoral issues.

He said: "Allegations of ballot rigging will be investigated and action taken against anyone found guilty of attempting to prevent people from exercising their right to vote. We would use forensic methods where necessary."

David Ward, Liberal Democrat candidate for Bradford North - which includes Bradford Moor - said candidates had worked hard legitimately encouraging people to use their right to vote, but was worried about any threats.

"This is a very high incidence concentrated in one area and we have heard rumours here about the misuse of postal votes. I would welcome the scrutiny."

Police officers will also be on the lookout in the polling stations on June 7 for cases of 'personation' - where people use other residents' votes.

Bradford North Conservative candidate Zahid Iqbal welcomed the analysis of the votes.

He said: "If there is any wrong doing I am sure it will be picked up, but I welcome the lifting of restrictions as a way of encouraging people to vote."

A spokesman from the Electoral Reform Society - which advises on election issues - said the Bradford Moor average was higher than normal.

"But it all depends on local circumstances. In Cardiff for example where there has been a lot of publicity by the Council urging people to use postal votes the figure is about one in four. There are also higher numbers of people in wards with large numbers of Asians wanting to vote in this way."