Achham voters in confusion over how to cast vote

BY OUR CORRESPONDENT Mangalsen, May 8: Voters in Achham district are in confusion over how to cast vote in the upcoming local-level elections. That’s because they haven’t been taught that by the concerned authorities yet.  

Unaware about the right way to vote, many voters there fear that their votes may turn out to be invalid. Even the candidates who went on a house-to-house campaign to request for votes also did not tell them how to cast their votes, said the locals.

Kokila Jaisi of Mangalsen Municipality-5 said the candidates told them only to cast vote on this or that sign but none had said about the right way of voting. 

In this local elections, voters have to cast their votes in seven places, including for mayor, deputy mayor, chairperson and five ward members.

That confusion is made worse by the coalition candidates in some places which require the voters to cast their votes in different signs.

It is believed that a significant number of spoiled votes will be cast this election if the voters in the alliance do not cast their votes properly. Locals blamed that the Election Commission has not conducted voter education during this election unlike in the past. 

According to District Election Office's information officer Gajendra Prakash Tharu, the commission is preparing to provide voters' education at the polling station on the day of polling. 

According to Tharu, there are no other programme for voter education before that.  

Political parties in the district, however, have claimed that they are preparing to provide voters' education to their voters. According to party leaders, they are preparing materials for voter education to distribute in the villages.

In the 2017 local level election, a total of 90,185 votes were cast in Achham, out of which 2,339 were invalid. There were 127,742 voters then, but now there are 156,280 voters.