PALPA, April 30: The political party leaders have stressed on need to move forward on creating an electoral atmosphere in the country by putting an end to the trend of postponing the local level elections. 

At an interaction programme on 'Civil Society's Role in Local Level Elections' held on Saturday by Palpa Development Centre and Cooperation for Social Dialogue here, participants called for holding the elections in a quick and smooth manner. 

On the occasion, CPN (Maoist Centre) Politburo member, Basanta Sharma (Kushal), said the importance of local elections will increase at the civilian level on the condition that the civil society informs the voters over the rights and duty of the local level polls. 

CPN (UML) Central Account Department member, Dhanendra Raj Ghimire, expressed an opinion that the civilians' rights will be secured if the local polls were conducted in two phases on the stipulated dates. 

Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) District Chairman, Dub Bahadur Kunwar, said all the parties must work together to make the local polls a success. 

Civil Society Palpa's Secretary, Bhesh Raj Subedi, argued that there were no alternatives to conducting the local polls as the local bodies have been operating without people's representatives for too long. 

Nepali Congress' women leaders Netri Ganga Poudel, Lalu Rana and Sunita Sharma along with legal practitioners Narayan Basyal and Gita Sharma called on the government to conduct the local polls on stipulated time and implement the constitution. 

At the programme, journalist Tilak Pathak presented a working paper on the role the civil society must play during the local polls. 

Palpa Development Centre Chairman, Krishna Pokharel, insisted that the civil society must create pressure to ensure that the local polls are conducted on scheduled dates. RSS 

 
• political party leaders
 
• civil society
 
• local polls