Kathmandu, June 29:

Representatives of a majority of the political parties today could not agree on the limit fixed by the Election Commission (EC) on the expenses which a candidate can make in the Constituent Assembly election.

The EC has proposed in the draft of the code of conduct for the election of the Constituent Assembly members that a candidate under the first-past-the-post election system spend only Rs 296,000 in the CA election.

It has been proposed in the draft code of conduct that the candidate can spend Rs 1,000 for buying the voters’ list, Rs 60,000 as expenses in vehicle, Rs 30,000 for fuel for vehicle and horse feed, Rs 55,000 for hiring loud speaker and printing pamphlets, Rs 50,000 for organising mass meeting and seminar and Rs 55,000 for mobilising cadres, office operation and publicity.

Representatives of the political parties, taking part in the discussions on the proposed election code of conduct here today, stressed the need to make the implementation and monitoring aspect of the code of conduct effective and strong.

They also suggested the Election Commission to fix the limit of election expenses of a candidate in consonance with the inflation.

As per the proposal of the EC, the candidate cannot take more than 50 persons along while filing the nomination, procession using vehicles including cycle, motorcycle and bus cannot be taken out and that various political parties cannot take out procession at the same time and same location.

The political party representatives agreed to this but said that use of only one light vehicle in one electoral constituency will not be enough.

The political party representatives urged the Commission to ensure that the PM, Speaker and Ministers do not misuse government vehicles to take part in meeting, seminars and gathering in course of the elections, and have the government media allocate time for all the parties.