Kathmandu, September 7

The Election Commission today allotted election symbols to all  91 parties registered at the EC for provincial and parliamentary polls slated for November 26 and December 7. Out of 95 political parties which applied for registration, 91 got election symbols while four merged with other parties.

A meeting of EC office bearers, including Chief Election Commissioner Ayodhi Prasad Yadav, decided to allot symbols to parties. Majority of parties, including the Nepali Congress, the CPN-UML, the CPN-Maoist Centre and the Rastriya Prajatantra Party retained their existing symbols.

The EC allotted ‘umbrella’ symbol to the newly formed Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal as demanded by it, and gave ‘umbrella in a circle’ symbol to Janashakti Nepal Party. The EC stated that Janashakti Nepal Party had demanded ‘umbrella’ as its poll symbol before the RJP-N demanded the same symbol.

Pashupati Shumsher JB Rana-led Rastriya Prajatantra Party-Democratic got ‘plough in a circle’ symbol, while Prakash Chandra Lohani-led Ekikrit Rastriya Prajatantra Party (Rastrabadi) got ‘plough in a square’ symbol.

The Bibeksheel Sajha Party got ‘scales’ as its election symbol. Baburam Bhattarai-led  Naya Shakti Party-Nepal got ‘left eye’ as its election symbol.

RJP-N leader Manish Kumar Suman said his party would oppose the EC’s decision to allot ‘umbrella in a circle’ symbol to Janashakti Nepal Party. “When the EC allotted umbrella symbol to our party, it should not have given a similar symbol to another party. This will only confuse voters and harm our party’s prospect in polls,” he said and alleged that EC office bearers were biased against the RJP-N.

Suman said allotting two similar symbols was against the election code of conduct and the EC’s objective of voters’ education. “We have seen in the first and second rounds of local polls that many votes were declared invalid due to complicated ballot papers. Allotting similar election symbols will again confuse voters and increase the percentage of invalid votes,” he added.