Dipayal, June 26

Security has been tightened at all the local levels with bomb disposal teams keeping in view the June 28 second phase of the civic polls in Province 7.

At a press meet organised by the far-western regional Administration Office, in Dipayal, western regional Administrator Sishir Kumar Dhungana said that security had been beefed up keeping in view the voting, ballot paper supply, and vote counting and victory rallies.

Stating that one bomb disposal team was arranged at every local level, Dhungana said that 90 bomb disposal teams, one mine detecting vehicle and Nepali Army’s ranger force were put on standby for security in the province.

Administrator Dhungana said the three-level security was put in place to avert any untoward incident before, during and after the polls. “Security has been tightened by keeping 318 polling centres in the list of highly sensitive and 337 polling centres in the sensitive zone.

According to Dhungana, every polling centre will have a team of 20 police personnel and temporary police personnel. APF personnel will be deployed.

As many as 22,705 security forces have been deployed to ensure the polls are peaceful at all the 88 local levels in Province 7. The province has one sub-metropolitan city, 33 municipalities and 54 rural municipalities. A total of 16,800 employees have been mobilised to hold polls in the province.

Helicopters have been kept on standby at Nepal Army’s far-western regional headquarters Dipayal, keeping in mind the security sensitivity.

The province has 1,109 polling booths and 1,781 voting centres. As many as 1,309,545 voters are eligible to cast their ballots in the province.