The government on Wednesday decided to hold the provincial and federal polls in two phases on November 26 and December 7.

The new decision, which comes 10 days after the government called both the elections together for November 26, is in line with the proposal of the Election Commission, which had all along been calling for holding the two major polls in two phases, saying conducting them together on the same date could be difficult in view of logistics management and weather.

The country must hold elections of provincial assemblies and House of Representatives by January 21 as per the constitutional deadline. Minister for Women Children and Social Welfare Asha Koirala said Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting decided to hold the polls in two phases to make the more manageable in terms of logistics and weather.

Earlier while deciding on August 21 to hold both the polls on November 26, the government had said it could consider them in two phases as well “if the security committee led by the home minister and the EC came up with such a recommendation”.

Minister for Home Affairs Janardan Sharma on Wednesday, however, denied that the decision to hold the polls in two phases was taken due to security reasons.

While reiterating is earlier call for holding the two polls in two phases, the EC had said it was extremely concerned whether around 34 million ballot papers could be printed on time. The Janak Siksha Samagari Kendra had taken 45 days to print 14 million ballot papers for the two phases of local elections.

The EC had also had drawn the government attention to weather situation in some parts of the country, especially mountain and Hill regions where voting can be hugely affected during extreme winter due to snowfall. The EC is most likely to arrange the first phase of polls in mountain and Hill regions in view of the weather.