Butwal, February 16:

More than three lakh people from all over the country ascended to Butwal today to participate in the inaugural ceremony of eighth general convention of the CPN-UML.

A large number of people covered the convention venue — Butwal Mandap — and five-kilometre stretch of the East-West Highway.

Hundreds of thousands of people from all the districts of Lumbini zone were present in Butwal for the inaugural ceremony. People from different walks of life, including students, government staffers and workers, attended the event.

All private and government schools and industries in Butwal were closed today. Since the students were not informed about the closure of schools, hundreds of students were present in the convention venue in their uniform.

People had started to converge in Butwal since 8 am and it continued till 5 pm. Thousands of volunteers, civil police personnel and Armed Police Force personnel were deployed to manage the crowd. Not only the supporters of the UML, people affiliated with different political parties arrived in the convention venue to listen to Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, NC president Girija Prasad Koirala and leaders of other political parties. However, the venue couldn’t accommodate the crowd and there were no sufficient seating arrangement for all.

The crowd chanted slogan against Minister for Supplies Rajendra Mahato when the latter started speech in Hindi language. Though the UML leaders requested the participants to respect the guest, the participants continued the hooting. Later Mahato relented and

delivered his speech in Nepali. Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav also delivered his speech in Nepali.

However, general secretary of Tarai Madhes Democratic Party Hridayesh Tripathi

spoke in Hindi.

After the inaugural session, many people went to Bhairahawa because of the shortage of hotel rooms in Butwal.

Many people were seen cooking food beside the highway. As the mobile phone service was disrupted from early morning, people faced difficulties in searching their friends.