Kathmandu, August 4

The Election Commission today said out-district voter registration was unexpectedly high in all three districts of Kathmandu Valley.

“The number of out-district voters is high in all districts, but in Kathmandu Valley it is unexpectedly high,” said EC official Chandra Sibakoti.  He said over 250,000 new voters had registered their names on the electoral roll until July 31.

The polls panel had started registering voters in all local levels from August 1. The EC said it would collect voter list from the local levels until August 15.

Deputy Director of Kathmandu Metropolitan City Saraswati Pokhrel said of the 900 people visiting the City Hall for voter registration every day, more than 650 were from outside the Valley. She said Kathmandu Metropolitan City had set up four desks exclusively to register voters from Kathmandu Valley.

“We give first priority to the locals, but they are very few in number. So we also register voters from outside the Valley from those desks,” said Pokhrel. She said Kathmandu Metropolitan City had been registering voters from 9:30am to 7:00pm every day.

The EC said voter registration would continue in all 744 local levels until August 17 and people could register their names from district and regional election offices. The EC expects participation of over 1.5 million new voters in provincial and parliamentary elections.