Kathmandu, July 20:

Election Constituency Delimitation Commission (ECDC) has been facing problems in reviewing its report because political leaders have failed to define the “technical difficulties” that had made its report unacceptable to Madhes earlier.

ECDC has completed its consultation with the leaders of parties in the legislature-parliament as well as lawmakers including those representing Tarai but it could not receive any “specific definition” for the technical difficulties.

“It was said the technical difficulties were related to 25 districts but we are not yet been provided with the specific definition or criteria to remove those difficulties,” ECDC spokesperson Gokul Prasad Burlakoti told this daily.

He said ECDC now was formulating the criteria on its own discretion to define the “basis” for reviewing those 25 districts. The ECDC had started to work on July 1 and it is expected to submit its second report within next week when it completes 21 working days. ECDC earlier had submitted its first report on April 12.

Dakshinkali to see mock polls today

Kathmandu: The Kathmandu District Election Office is conducting a mock constituent assembly election at Dakshinkali Village Development Committee (VDC) on Saturday. It is being done for the first time in order to identify if there was any weakness in the preparation of Election Commission (EC).

At least 11 polling staffers and scores of security personnel would be deployed at the election booth in Dakshinkali to conduct election for two hours in the morning, although the EC has set the voting time from 7:00 am to 5:00 pm on the real Election Day on November 22. The voters of Dakshinkali have already been informed about the mock election, and some 200 of them are expected to cast their votes. The EC is expecting to receive at least 1,100 voters in one polling booth on the real Election Day.

“The mock election is being conducted in order to know whether we are preparing well,” Laxman Prasad Bhattrai, the EC spokesperson told The Himalayan Times.

The EC would use the same ballot box that would be used on the Election Day and would use the dummy ballot-paper with 62 different election-symbols for the mock election. The ballot box can contain at least 1,000 ballot-papers. “The mock election is being conducted also to find out how long does it take for a voter to get through,” added an official at EC. — HNS