The Nepal Election Commission is holding local level by-elections for 41 vacant positions on Sunday. In the fray are 377 candidates, including independents, according to the commission.

The by-polls are set to be held in local units across the seven provinces. The voting began at 7am and will continue till 5pm.

Three of the total 44 vacant posts were elected unopposed. Now, one municipal mayor, one deputy mayor, two rural municipality chairpersons, four vice-chairpersons, and 33 ward chairpersons are up for grabs.

The district coordination committee candidates in Kailali and Okhaldhunga were elected unopposed from the Nepali Congress. While Tek Raj Bhattarai in Kailali and Tika Kumari Chaudhary in Okhaldhunga of the Congress were unchallenged, CPN (Maoist Centre) candidate Jagat Gharti had no contenders for the Putha Uttarganga Rural Municipality ward-2 chairperson post, according to election officials.

The commission is conducting voting from 7 am to 5 pm on Sunday at the polling stations set up at respective local units where the seats have gone vacant.

Nita Pokharel Aryal, spokesperson for the Election Commission, said that all preparations for the by-polls have been completed.

“Special arrangements have been made to give priority to disabled, senior citizens, pregnant women and other people requiring different arrangements to cast their votes,” Aryal said.

According to Aryal, those whose names are included in the final voter list can cast their votes showing the original proof of voter identity card, Nepali citizenship certificate, national identity card, passport, driving licence or permanent account number card.

Commission officials expect higher voter turnout compared to earlier elections. According to an officer at the commission, the election body analysed some lapses in the past elections and fixed them. “We believe the turnout will be higher this time,” says an official.

Counting of votes will begin immediately after the voting is completed, and all the ballot boxes will be collected at the designated counting centres. The commission has said that the count can be followed on its website.

The commission plans to announce the final by-election results within two days.

“We expect to use a helicopter to collect ballot boxes of Gaurishankar Rural Municipality of Dolakha due to the difficult geography of the village,” Durga Prasad Chalise, the deputy spokesperson for the commission said.

“It may take some time to collect ballot boxes in Sarkegad Rural Municipality of Humla and Swamikartik Khapar Rural Municipality of Bajura, but other than that, we will have no problem starting vote counting immediately.”

The commission is holding by-elections as per the legal provision.

According to the Local Level Election Act-2017, if the position of the district coordination committee chief, deputy chief, rural municipality chairman, vice-chairman, municipality mayor, deputy mayor and ward chair fall vacant for any reason before the end of their term and if more than a year of their term remains, the remaining term will be filled through a by-election.

The elections are being held only to elect 41 representatives at local units but political parties have given priority to the by-polls as if it is going to be a test of their strength.

Even top politicians such as CPN (Maoist Centre) chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal, Nepali Congress general secretaries Gagan Thapa and Bishwa Prakash Sharma and CPN-UML General Secretary Shankar Pokharel, among other influential leaders, were actively involved in election campaigns in favour of their candidates.

Some reckon people could express their disenchantment towards traditional parties because of their inability to deliver on governance.

But Uddhab Pyakurel, an assistant professor at the Kathmandu University, said the by-elections can’t be seen as a voice of the Nepali people at large.

Pyakurel thinks that regular elections are different to by-elections and by-elections results seldom reflect on future election results.

Sunday’s by-elections are taking place only for the 41 posts of certain local units. There are 753 local units (276 municipalities and 460 rural municipalities), further divided into 6,743 wards.

“So the results of the 41 local contests are insufficient to draw definite conclusions about the future,” Pyakurel said.

It could be an indicator to analyse anti-incumbency if the parties lose the seats that they had won earlier, he added. “However, the results themselves cannot be considered a solid basis to gauge the future poll performance of political parties.”

Out of the 44 seats for which by-elections are being held on Sunday, 30 were won by the Congress in the earlier local polls while seven seats each were won by the UML and the Maoist Centre.