Feb 8, Kathmandu:  Voting has started in the by-elections of members of the National Assembly under other groups of Lumbini province. Chief Electoral Officer Kripasur Karki said that the voting started at 10 am on Wednesday at the staff meeting center in Ghorahi.

He informed me that voting will be held till 3 pm. CPN-UML, Nepali Congress and Civil Liberation Party candidates are competing. On behalf of the ruling coalition, the candidatures of UML's Kumar Dashaundi, Congress's Madhav Prasad Acharya, and Civil Liberties' Rajendraveer Rai have been registered.

Although Dashaundi's candidacy was registered on behalf of the power coalition, Unmukti filed a separate candidacy expressing dissatisfaction. Dashaundi and Acharya are residents of Rolpa while Rai is from Banke. Chief Electoral Officer Karki informed that the counting of votes will be done after the end of voting.

UML's Khimlal Bhattarai resigned during the House of Representatives elections and by-elections are about to be held for the vacant post. Bhattarai of Rupandehi left the National Assembly to run for the House of Representatives election. He had registered his candidacy from Rupandehi-5, but Bhattarai's candidature was canceled due to the fact that Basudev Ghimire, the former head of Tilottma Municipality, had registered before him from UML.

The members of the provincial assembly and the head and deputy head of the municipality are voting for the members of the National Assembly. The election office has informed us that one state assembly member will have 48 votes and each of the chief deputy heads of the local level will have 18 votes.

The total number of voters in Lumbini province is 305, out of which the number of provincial assembly members is 87 and the number of municipal chiefs and deputy chiefs is 218. There are 109 municipalities in Lumbini province. Among them, Congress won 48, UML 27, Maoist Center 25, Jaspa 3, Janamorcha and LOSPA 2/2, and RPP and Janata Pragatisheel 1/1 each.