Kathmandu, August 24

The Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal today decided to take part in local, provincial and parliamentary elections and use ‘bicycle’ as its election symbol.

Coordinator of RJP-N Presidium Mahantha Thakur said at a press conference organised by the party here today that the party would write to the Election Commission seeking bicycle as its election symbol.

The RJP-N had earlier demanded umbrella as its election symbol but the Election Commission had told the party to that it could not grant umbrella symbol to the party due to technical and legal reasons. The EC had told the RJP-N to choose one of the election symbols of the six parties — Tarai Madhes Democratic Party, Tarai Madhes Sadbhawana Party-Nepal, Sadbhawana Party, National Madhes Socialist Party, the Nepal Sadbhawana Party and Madhesi Janaadhikar Forum-Nepal — which had merged to create the RJP-N.

Bicycle was used as electyon symbol by National Madhes Socialist Party in the past.

Thakur said his party would take part in the polls but would continue to oppose the constitution till it was amended to address the demands of Madhesis and other marginalised communities. He said 64 per cent of the lawmakers present in the House had voted in favour of the constitution amendment bill which highlighted the need of amendment to the constitution.

The RJP-N issued a press release saying that the constitution amendment bill failed because of conspiracy hatched against the bill. He said the CPN-UML showed its racist and anti-Madhesi attitude by voting against the bill. “The country’s peace and stability suffered blow as opposition forces hatched a conspiracy against national unity, communal harmony, national integrity and an inclusive Nepal. This incident will have far-reaching implications and we are worried,” the RJP-N said in its release.

The party also said that it was government’s weakness not to capitalise on the positive momentum to pass the constitution amendment bill. “Sixty-four per cent people’s representatives have accepted that the constitution, which some forces boasted had endorsement of 90 per cent majority, is flawed and there is a need to amend the constitution,” the RJPN said in its release. “Even though the constitution amendment bill was defeated in the Parliament, the agendas of rights and identity that the RJP-N has been raising, were established in the Parliament.”

Member of RJP-N presidium Rajendra Mahato read out the press release saying that the Pushpa Kamal Dahal and Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government fulfilled most of the RJP-N’s demands as the party had continued to protest and boycotted the first and second round of local polls.

He said the government gave martyrdom status to those who were killed during agitation, compensation to those who lost their properties in arson attacks, and monthly allowance to those who sustained serious injuries, among others.

The party also announced that its leaders and cadres would tie black bands on their arms to protest from August 25 to September 6 against the political forces’ conspiracy to cause   the constitution amendment bill to fail. The party also decided to send its leaders to various districts to select candidates for the posts of local levels. For this task, the party decided to send Narsingh Chaudhary to Saptari, Gajadhar Yadav to Siraha, Arun Singh to Dhanusha, Govind Chaudhary to Mahottari, Shekhar Singh to Sarlahi, Satya Narayan Mandal to Rautahat, Malamati Rana Tharu to Bara and Bijay Gupta to Parsa. The party has also formed a manifesto drafting committee.