600,517 voters register for postal voting

A total of 600,517 voters have so far registered through the “Postal Vote BD” app to exercise their voting rights in the 13th Jatiya Sangsad Election and the referendum.

Alongside expatriate Bangladeshis from different countries of the world, government employees to be engaged in election duties and those staying outside their own voter constituencies are also registering through the app.

Meanwhile, the Election Commission (EC) has started sending postal ballots to expatriate voters who registered through the app. Over the last four days, the EC has dispatched postal ballots to 124,300 expatriate voters who completed registration during this period.

Team Leader of the Out of Country Voting System and Implementation (OCV-SDI) project Salim Ahmad Khan confirmed BSS that postal ballots were sent on Monday, Sunday, Saturday and Friday to 124,300 expatriate voters in 16 countries.

According to the postal voting update published on the EC website until 11:30 am on Tuesday, a total of 600,517 voters have registered through the “Postal Vote BD” app so far. Of them, 560,992 are male voters and 39,523 are female voters.

Among expatriates, the highest number of registrations came from Saudi Arabia with 141,610 voters. This was followed by Qatar with 52,774, Oman with 39,179, Malaysia with 36,880, the United Arab Emirates with 26,700, the United States with 24,391, Kuwait with 20,539, the United Kingdom with 19,308, Singapore with 17,101, Italy with 14,204 and Canada with 11,409 registered voters.

On the other hand, 112,345 Bangladeshi voters currently residing within the country have registered under the in-country postal voting category through the app until 11:30 am today.

In terms of district-wise registration, Cumilla recorded the highest number with 59,496 voters registering through the app, followed by Dhaka with 51,167, Chattogram with 49,842, Noakhali with 34,096, Sylhet with 24,726 and Chandpur with 23,366 registered voters.

By parliamentary constituency, the highest number of registrations was recorded in Feni-3 with 9,164 voters. This was followed by Chattogram-15 with 8,435, Noakhali-1 with 7,991, Cumilla-10 with 7,906 and Noakhali-3 with 7,554 voters registering for postal voting.

Salim Ahmad Khan said EC will allocate election symbols to candidates on Wednesday, January 21. Once symbol allocation is completed, voters will be informed through the app or the EC website. To cast their votes, voters will log into the “Postal Vote BD” app, view the list of candidates of the respective constituency and, following the instructions, mark a tick or cross in the blank box beside the symbol on the ballot paper.

He said if any expatriate voter casts a vote before symbol allocation after being certain about a candidate in advance, the vote will not be cancelled. However, according to the rules, expatriate voters are expected to cast their votes after viewing candidates following symbol allocation.

He said expatriate Bangladeshi voters will be able to register through the app until December 25, and the registration deadline will not be extended beyond that date as it would not be possible to send mail afterwards.