The Election Commission on Saturday will kick off the nine-day hearing and disposal of the appeal petitions filed against the acceptance and rejection of nomination papers during the scrutiny as the deadline for receiving such petitions expired on Friday.
The Commission, chaired by Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin, will hear and settle some 70 petitions (serial-1 to 70) on Saturday. The EC will dispose of all the petitions by January 18 next.
The hearing will start at 10:00am at Nirbachan Bhaban. A petitioner has been asked not to be accompanied by more than two persons in the hearing room, said EC Director (Public Relations) Ruhul Amin Mollik.
The Election Commission has finalized the hearing schedule for the first four days. According to the schedule, the petition no 1-36 will be heard from 10:00am to 1:00pm, while the petition no 37-70 from 2:00pm to 5:00pm on Saturday.
Besides, the Commission will hear and dispose of the petition no 71-140 on Sunday, the petition no 141-210 on Monday and the petition no 211-280 on Tuesday.
EC officials said the number of total appeal petitions is 645.
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.
During the scrutiny, the 69 returning officers --two divisional commissioners (Dhaka and Chattogram), 64 district deputy commissioners and three regional election officers (Dhaka, Chattogram and Khulna) – declared that the nomination papers of a total of 1,842 candidates valid and that of 723 others invalid.
Then the Commission started receiving the appeal petitions against the decisions of the returning officers on January 05.
645 appeals filed with EC against decisions on nomination papers
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).