The total number of voters in the country now stands at 123,732,274, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) AMM Nasir Uddin announced on Sunday.
The CEC disclosed the updated statistics while inaugurating a vibrant rally in front of Nirbachan Bhaban in the capital, marking National Voter Day 2025, reports UNB.
As per tradition, the final updated voter list is published on March 2 every year, coinciding with the observance of National Voter Day. However, this year's voter list updating process, which began on January 20, is still going on.
During the event, the CEC reiterated the Election Commission's commitment to conducting free, fair and credible elections, seeking cooperation from all stakeholders to achieve this goal.
Speaking at a discussion, he said, "Our only agenda is to ensure a fair, beautiful and acceptable election. We are working to deliver what we have promised."
He was addressing the discussion at Nirbachan Bhaban in the capital, marking National Voter Day 2025.
This year, National Voter Day is being observed with the theme "We will cast votes together in your and my Bangladesh" (Tomar Amar Bangladeshe, Vote Dibo Milemishe).
Nasir Uddin said, "We have no personal agenda. We are not here to implement anyone else's agenda. Our agenda is the agenda of 18 crore people. Our agenda is Bangladesh's agenda."
He asked the election officials to make a promise in the holy month of Ramadan that they would work impartially.
Referring to past flawed elections, he urged election officials to focus on the future, not wasting time by doing post-mortems of these elections. "Dead (flawed) elections were held in the past. How many more postmortems will we do on this dead body? How much more time will we lament for these?" he said.
During his different field-level visits, the officials informed him that they had to work in many ways under these circumstances for various reasons, said the CEC.
"I told them, 'let's forget about it and move forward. Will we keep performing post-mortems of a corpse and continue lamenting? The day for lamenting is over,'" he said.
The CEC said election engineering and vote manipulation never bring a good result finally for any one.
Though anyone can get victory for the time being by resorting to election engineering and vote violence, but in the end it is not good for them, the country and the people, he said.
Nasir Uddin urged the 180 million people of the country to stand by them as his commission is in a fight to establish their rights.
Noting that people have not been able to vote for a long time, he said now it is the time to establish the right to vote. The voting cannot be seen as just a right now rather it is now also the responsibility of the citizen, he said.
The CEC said people have high expectations from them unlike other past election commissions. "Now people's expectations have increased a lot. It has made us think about how we will fulfill these expectations," he said.
He said differences of political parties in their stand and opinion are not a problem rather it is the beauty of democracy.
"Many say that different parties are taking confrontational positions. I see it differently. This is a characteristic of a democratic state. If there are 30 parties, we will not all think the same. Each party has a different perspective and an interest. So they will speak from their own perspective. That is the beauty of democracy," the CEC said.
The CEC believes that even though the parties have differences in views, they will finally reach a consensus.
Noting that a consensus has already been reached over a fair and credible election, he said, "Everyone agrees on this point and no one has been found to disagree that he doesn't want a fair, beautiful and acceptable election…. Everyone who has come to the meeting with us has said that they want a fair and acceptable election."
Nasir Uddin suggested the National Consensus Commission can take written promises from political parties to follow the electoral code.
