Voting for the election of members of House of Representatives and Provincial Assembly began across the country at 7am today morning.
Voters have already reached the polling centres since early morning. The number of women voters is seen significantly high in the polling centres. Arrangements have been made to give priority to senior citizens, persons with disabilities and the pregnant for the voting, according to the Election Commission (EC). Voters will be voting by putting swastika stamp on four separate ballot papers for the first-past-the-post and proportional representation system of the elections.
A total of 17,988,570 voters are eligible to vote in the election, for which 22,227 polling booths in 10,892 polling centres have been established. Voting will continue till 5 pm. This is the second time Nepal is holding general elections after the promulgation of a new Constitution in 2015. Voters are prohibited from taking mobile phones or cameras inside the polling station.
There are 1, 79, 88,570 eligible voters. There are 22,227 polling stations in 10,892 across the country.
The EC printed 8,4,21,500 ballot papers. A total of 5,636 candidates are contesting the elections to the lower house and the Provincial Assembly under the first-past-the-post (FPTP) category, with 5,907 seats set aside for proportional representation (PR) category in the final closed list.
According to the EC, 2, 46,960 government employees have been mobilized during elections.
A total of 298,589 security personnel have been deployed to guard voting booths. Of them, 74,849 are from the Nepal Army, 71,693 from the Nepal Police, 35,116 from the Armed Police Force, 115,000 temporary police, and 1,921 from the National Intelligence Department.
Nepal-India and Nepal-China border points have been sealed for 72 hours starting Thursday, in view of the elections.
According to the EC, 7,219 individuals representing national and international organizations have taken permission to observe the polls. The chief election commissioners of India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Maldives and election commissioners of Sri Lanka and South Korea are scheduled to observe elections. Japan's State Minister of Foreign Affairs Takei Shunsuke and representatives of Kathmandu-based 18 diplomatic missions is arriving here today itself to observe the elections.
(With inputs from RSS)
