Kabul, Sep 6 (DPA) With some three quarters of vote counted, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has edged closer to the absolute majority needed to avoid a run off with his main challenger Abdullah Abdullah, the country's Independent Election Commission (IEC) said Sunday.

Karzai has received 48.6 percent of votes from nearly 75 percent of polling stations tallied by Sunday, Daoud Ali Najafi, head of the IEC told a news conference. The incumbent is more than 17 points ahead of Abdullah, who garnered 31.7 percent.

A run-off in October would follow if neither candidate made it over the 50 percent mark, but Karzai is widely expected to win the elections.

He has seen a steady climb in his vote in the partial results that have been announced in stages by the election body in the past two weeks.

It is likely that Karzai will extend his lead further, as results from all the provinces where Abdullah was thought to have strong support have nearly finished being counted.

But widespread allegations of fraud have marred the Western-backed election, and are likely to threaten the legitimacy of the result - only the second in the history of the country.

Abdullah, who already accused Karzai's camp of rigging the vote, blamed the IEC for being partisan to the incumbent in a press conference Saturday.

Abdullah showed media a list results of polling stations in southern and eastern provinces, where the results showed hundreds of identical numbers for Karzai and none for any other candidate.