Birgunj, December 14

Lack of voter education resulted in more than 10 per cent invalid votes in parliamentary and provincial elections in Parsa district.

Of the total votes cast in the district, 20,835 (10.09 per cent) votes were invalid under the first-past-the post election, as per chief returning officer’s office, Parsa. The district has two parliamentary constituencies.

“Voters got confused as the volunteers deployed by Election Commission and political parties failed to educate them properly about how to cast their ballots in three separate ballot papers,” said Chief Returning Officer, Parsa, Nagendra Lal Karna.

He said some ballot papers were stamped multiple times, clearly indicating that the voters lacked knowledge of how to cast ballots the right way. He also added some ballots of the FPTP election were found in ballot boxes meant for proportional representation election. The district election office spent Rs 3.6 million for voter education.