DHAKA, 16 July 2007 — Bangladesh will hold parliamentary elections sometime between October and December next year, the election commission’s chief said here yesterday.

“The cut-off time frame for the election set by the interim authority is no later than the end of 2008, and the commission is trying to hold the polls definitely within that time frame,” Chief Election Commissioner A.T.M. Shamsul Huda told reporters.

As part of an “election road map” he unveiled at a news conference, Huda also said a digital voters roll with photographic identification would be finalized by October 2008 and that political parties intending to contest the coming polls must register themselves with the commission by June next year.

The EC electoral road map envisages four major agenda: reconstitution of the Election Commission with internal reorganization, electoral reforms, preparation of electoral roll and delimitation of constituencies. “We will not allow any party to participate in the election without registration,” Huda said.

Both the government, headed by former central back head Fakhruddin Ahmed, and the commission have said they would hold a free, fair and credible election after implementing a string of electoral reforms and completing a drive against corrupt politicians.

Preparatory to the elections, the Election Commission will hold talks with political parties from next September to November on electoral reforms and other election-related affairs.

More than 170 senior political figures have been detained, and some convicted and sentenced for corruption since the interim authority took over in January, imposed a state of emergency and canceled an election planned for Jan. 22. Huda said registration of the voters would begin formally later this month in the northern Rajshahi district and gradually spread all over the country.

A pilot project was successfully completed at Sreepur near the capital, Dhaka, in May, he said.

Politics in Bangladesh revolves around two biggest parties — the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the Awami League, led respectively by former prime ministers Khaleda Zia and Hasina Wajed.

Huda said the commission was planning to hold local elections in rural and urban areas from January 2008.

Mysterious Disease

Bangladeshi health officials were investigating the cause of a mysterious illness that left dozens of students and teachers unconscious at a school near the capital, officials said yesterday.

Over the past week, at least 50 students and four teachers suffered headaches, nausea or convulsions before losing consciousness at Adiabad Islamia High School and College in Narsingdi district, about 30 kilometers east of Dhaka.

A team of health experts from a disease control center and the military visited the school over the weekend to investigate, principal Shakhawat Hossain said.

“They are checking the classrooms and the patients,” Hossain said.

Public health official Birendranath Sinha said a virus, chemical or gas contamination, could be responsible. He did not elaborate.

About 20 students were taken to state-run Narsingdi Sadar Hospital and released after receiving first aid. Some 30 others were still being treated at other medical centers. The school, which has nearly 1,200 students on a sprawling riverside campus, was closed for three days, local government administrator Jillur Rahman said.