'National, local polls not possible simultaneously'

KATHMANDU, Oct 10: The Election Commission (EC) has ruled out possibility of holding election of both Constituent Assembly (CA) or parliament and local bodies simultaneously by using Electronic Voting Machine (EVMs)



The EC´sview came at a time when some political parties have been airing their views for conducting national and local elections simultaneously. [break]



Speaking at an interaction with political parties on Wednesday, Acting Chief Commissioner Neel Kantha Uprety said it was not possible to conduct elections for local bodies by using the EVMs.



"Both elections [national and local] cannot be conducted using the EVMs due to some technical problems," he added.



Talking to Republica, Election Commissioner Ayodhi Prasad Yadav said it was not feasible at this time to hold both national and local elections altogether by using the EVMs due to different procedures of the elections.



"The will be different types of ballot papers for local and national elections," said Yadav, adding, "Our voters are not enough educated to cast their votes successfully in such situation." Elections for local bodies have not been conducted since the last 15 years.



Uprety said that the constitutional electoral body has already decided in principle to conduct next election across the country by using the EVMs.



According to the officials, the EC will need 148,306 ballot units, 55,537 control units, 76,068 batteries, among other equipments to hold elections by using EVMs.



EC Spokesperson Sharada Prasad Trital said that the EC will need an estimated Rs 1.64 billion to import EVMs from India. "It will take six months for India to export us the equipments after our formal demand," he added.



Responding to questions raised by leaders of various political parties, Uprety stated that EVMs is a credible technology to use in elections. "There will be no riggings, if we use the EVMs," he stated.



Speaking at the program, political leaders stated that using the EVMs would be very challenging as most of voters in the country were unaware of such technology.



"The voters need to be massively educated about the EVMs," said UCPN (Maoist) leader Prahalad Budhathoki.



CPN-UML leader Agni Kharel maintained that the EVMs would be best technology to use in elections to avoid riggings.



NC central committee member Man Bahadur Biswokarma stressed on the need for national identity card along with voters´ card.

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