UP polls likely to be postponed, decision on Thursday

The election to various union parishads is likely to be suspended in the wake of a spike in coronavirus infection across the country.

The opinion to postpone the polls came at a meeting of the Election Commission on Monday. However, the EC will finalise the decision at its meeting on 1 April.

According to EC sources, the Monday meeting decided to help the scheduled elections until 31 March.

Voting in Jashore’s Sadar and Madaripur’s Kalkini municipalities and a ward each in Thakurgaon’s Sadar and Chapainawabganj’s Shibganj municipalities were scheduled on Wednesday. Voting in these places had been postponed previously.

Voting is scheduled to be held to 323 UPs in 63 upazilas of 20 districts of the country on April 11. The voting to about 4,500 UPs in the country will take place in several phases.

The election commissioners sat on Monday after the government reported the highest number of coronavirus cases in a single day - 5,181 cases – in the past 24 hours.

The voting for the UP chairman post under party symbol took place from in more than about 4,500 UPs in the country 22 March and June of 2016.

The Local Government (Union Parishad) Act states that election should be held within the period of 180 days of the expiration of the term of the union parishad.

The voting was set to begin from March but it was fixed for April because of delay in updating voter lists.