According to the proposal, members of the local unit of a registered political party will primarily elect through secret ballots two or more tentative candidates for each parliamentary area and the party's central parliamentary board will choose from the list a candidate for the constituency.

Election Commissioner Brig Gen (retd) Sakhawat Hossain revealed this while talking to reporters at his office yesterday.

At present, the political parties' parliamentary boards composed of party chiefs and some other top leaders enjoy absolute power to choose the candidates to contest in the parliamentary election and grass- roots level leaders have little to say in the process.

Using this power, the major political parties, especially the BNP and Awami League reportedly made huge amounts of money by selling party nominations to businessmen and black money holders during the previous parliamentary elections, while the dedicated leaders were ignored in many cases.

The new proposal as well as the proposed conditions for a political party to get registration with the EC will be finalised upon consultation with the major political parties after the embargo on indoor politics is lifted.

Once the proposal is made a rule, the political parties will have to include the provision in their constitutions and follow it to nominate candidates for the parliamentary elections. If the proposal is implemented, the parliamentary boards will no longer have the absolute power to choose candidates.

Besides, locals will be able to know about the prospective candidates and the leaders who want to contest the polls will work for the betterment of the locality, Election Commissioner Sakhawat said.

"It will also help to curb nomination business," he said, adding that the EC suggests that the political parties follow the procedure for nominating their candidates for the parliamentary elections to extricate themselves from the existing situation.

The EC has already made a set of proposals regarding the political parties' registration system, the election commissioner said, adding, "Leadership from grass-roots level to the central committee will have to be elected through secret ballots to ensure the practice of democracy within the political parties."

Transparency and intra-party democracy are required before people can expect it to work in a democratic way, he said.

"We don't have anything to say as to who will be leaders of a political party. The workers of a party will elect their leaders. We just want to assist them in bringing about some reforms to ensure the practice of democracy within the parties," he added.

As part of the ongoing reform initiatives, the EC has already made a set of proposals for electoral reforms including some conditions for a political party to get registration with the EC.

As per the EC proposals, a political party must be registered with the EC to contest the parliamentary election and no registered political party shall form any front organisation with the students or teachers of educational institutions and no political party shall have any branch abroad.

To get registration, a political party will not require making specific provisions in its constitution regarding inclusion of at least 33 per cent women as office bearers in the central and other committees

The EC also made proposals to ensure financial transparency of the political parties.

The EC, however, cannot proceed with the proposals since it is facing difficulties to hold talks with the political parties to finalise the proposals due to the embargo on indoor politics.

The chief election commissioner at a meeting with the law adviser on April 4 asked the government to lift the ban on indoor politics allowing the EC to hold talks with the political parties. But the army- backed caretaker government has not yet responded to the EC's request.