A total of 469 aspirants have filed appeal petitions with the Election Commission till Thursday, a day before the expiry of deadline, challenging returning officers’ decisions on the rejection and acceptance of nomination papers for the February 12 national election.

Among them, 174 petitions were submitted on Thursday, while 131 on Wednesday, 122 on Tuesday and the remaining 22 on Monday.

The 174 petitions filed on Thursday include 164 appeals against the cancellation of the nomination papers and the 10 others against the acceptance of the nomination papers, said  EC Director (Public Relations) Ruhul Amin Mollik on Thursday.

The Election Commission will receive the appeal petitions till Friday and then the Commission will hear and dispose of the petitions from January 10 to 18.

During the five-day nomination paper scrutiny from December 30 to January 04, the 69 returning officers – two divisional commissioners (Dhaka and Chattogram), 64 district deputy commissioners and three regional election commissioners (Dhaka, Chattogram and Khulna) – declared that the nomination papers of a total of 1,842 candidates valid and that of 723 others invalid.

A total of 2,568 aspirants submitted nomination papers for the country’s 300 constituencies by the December-29 deadline to contest the 13th parliamentary election.

The Election Commission on December 11 announced the election schedule to arrange the national election and the referendum on the July National Charter (Constitutional Reform) Implementation Order simultaneously on February 12, 2026.

According to the schedule, the last date for the withdrawal of candidature is January 20. The election campaign will start on January 22 and continue till 48 hours before the balloting period (7:30am on February 10).