Nepal’s EC Focuses on Voter Education

Nepal’s Election Commission is stepping up voter education efforts ahead of the March 5 parliamentary elections, aiming to reduce the high number of invalid ballots seen in previous polls.

In the 2022 federal and provincial elections, 5.06% of votes were invalid.

Of the 11 million ballots cast under the first-past-the-post system, more than 449,000 were rejected.

Under the proportional system, over 721,000 ballots were invalidated.

Commission spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai says the plan includes community outreach and expanded digital campaigns to ensure voters clearly understand how to cast valid ballots.

Earlier, in the 2022 local elections, invalid votes reached 13.24%, with nearly 8.3 million of the 11.8 million ballots rejected, a trend the Commission is determined to reverse.