BNP alleges bias in postal ballot arrangement

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has alleged that the postal ballot papers prepared for overseas voters deliberately placed certain party symbols first, giving some groups an unfair advantage.

BNP's representative team raised the issue at an Election Commission meeting, claiming the arrangement was designed so that the party's symbol would "not be easily visible", said Standing Committee member Nazrul Islam after a meeting on Tuesday.

Nazrul said, "We have emphasised that millions of our brothers and sisters living abroad are registered to vote via postal ballot and will exercise their franchise in this election, reports bdnews24.com.

"The ballot papers sent to them… some may think it coincidental, but we believe it was very deliberately designed to place certain political parties' names and symbols on the first lines. In contrast, the BNP's name and symbol appear almost in the centre, which, when folded, makes it less visible."

He said the party had drawn the chief election commissioner's attention to the issue.

"We discussed this with the commission. Their initial response suggested they had not considered it in that way and were focused only on whether the arrangement was alphabetical. But we pointed out that five columns and fourteen lines were used, causing three specific parties to appear at the top line.

"Had there been four or six columns, or 12 or 16 lines instead of 14, this arrangement would not have been possible. We consider this intentional. Perhaps the commission did not notice, but those who actually designed it clearly did so with purpose."

This year, for the first time, overseas voters were able to register via the mobile app Postal Vote BD, with more than 750,000 Bangladeshis responding.