KATHAMNDU, Nov 18/ The Election Commission has issued an order against 16 media houses to furnish clarification within 24 hours for violating the election code of conduct. Among them, there are 11 daily newspapers, four weeklies, and a television channel.Unfortunately, the EC informed this issuing a press release on Sunday but did not mention the names of media that were sought clarification. The press release issued by EC Spokesperson Bir Bahadur Rai mentioned that the media were sought clarification based on the monitoring conducted by the EC’s monitoring unit.
The silent period had begun from Saturday midnight. During the silent period, the political parties are banned to conduct election publicity as assembly, gathering and other activities that influence voters. And during this period, the media too cannot disseminate any publicity materials about any political party or leader.
The ‘silent period’ as the election code of conduct issued on Saun 7 by the EC is ‘period from 48 hours ahead of the day of voting till the closure of the voting’.
However, during this period, the media can disseminate the news and information provided by the EC only.