TDS Desk:

Law enforcing agencies will be deployed for seven days around the parliamentary election and referendum vote.

According to a circular issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs on Wednesday, security forces will remain on the ground from Feb 8 to Feb 14 to maintain law and order during the election period.

The circular states that law enforcing agencies will be deployed four days ahead of the polls, on polling day, and for two days afterward.

The parliamentary election and referendum are scheduled to be held on Feb 12.

The election will involve around 127.5 million voters, with voting set to take place in about 260,000 polling booths across nearly 43,000 polling stations in 300 constituencies.

In the initial coordination meeting, a plan was announced to deploy 13 to 18 members of law enforcing agencies at each polling station.

Overall, more than 700,000 members of different law enforcing agencies will be responsible for election security.

Of them, around 550,000 Ansar and Village Defence Party (VDP) personnel will be assigned to polling stations.

More than 90,000 members of the armed forces will also be deployed.

In addition, members of the police, Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) and the Coast Guard will be involved in maintaining security.

The Chief Election Commissioner announced the election schedule on Dec 11.

The following day, a potential candidate was shot.

Subsequently, two election offices were set on fire, raising concerns over law and order ahead of the polls.

In view of the situation, security has been increased at the offices of the Chief Election Commissioner, the election commissioners, the EC secretary, returning and assistant returning officers, as well as other election-related offices.

The Election Commission held two meetings with top officials of law enforcing agencies — one before the announcement of the schedule and another afterward.

Following those meetings, the home ministry issued a circular outlining the law enforcement deployment plan.