The Election Commission has finalized the rules for the use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) in the upcoming parliamentary election.
The rules were finalized at the 38th meeting of the commission at its office in Dhaka’s Agargaon area on Sunday.
The commission will convene again to decide on the election schedule of 11th general polls.
Election Commission Joint Secretary SM Asaduzzaman confirmed the matter to the media.
The Commission formulated the rules following the recent amendment of the Representation of the People Order (Amendment), 1972 which incorporated a provision of use of EVM in general elections.
Returning officers and presiding officers would control the EVM units at polling stations in accordance with the rules.
Earlier on October 31, President Abdul Hamid promulgated an ordinance amending the RPO incorporating the provision of use of EVMs in parliamentary polls.
According to the RPO, persons involved in misuse of EVM would be jailed for three-seven years.
The Commission sent the proposed amendments to the Law Ministry in September, even though Election Commissioner Mahbub Talukder opposed and dissented from his colleagues on the use of EVMs in the next general election at a meeting of the commission on August 30.
On September 18, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council approved a project of the commission to procure 150,000 EVMs in three phases in the next five years at a cost of Tk3,825 crore.
In the dialogue the Commission arranged in 2017, 35 of the 40 registered political parties, including the main opposition BNP, opposed the use of EVMs in the next general election.
The rest of the five parties — the ruling Awami League and its allies the Workers Party of Bangladesh, the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal faction led by Hasanul Haq Inu, Bangladesh Samajtantrik Dal (M-L), and the Zaker Party — were in favour of using EVMs.
In May 2017, the chief election commissioner said that EVMs will be used in the next parliamentary polls if all political parties agreed.
In November 2017, he said that EVMs will not be used in the next general election as the commission was not prepared for it.
The Commission’s interest in using EVMs resurfaced in 2017 after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina requested President Abdul Hamid to ask the Commission to use EVMs in the 11th parliamentary elections due by January 28, 2019.
The EVM technology will be used for the first time in the national election, eight years after being introduced in the local government elections.
The EVMs were first used in June 2010, in the Chittagong City election. However, from 2015, the EC stopped using the technology as it found some errors.
EVMs were later reintroduced in the Rangpur City election in 2016.
Check out the beginner’s guide to Electronic Voting Machines (EVM)
