The Election Commission appeared to be in no hurry to give registration to new political parties while some 30 of them have applied for registration to take part in the next general election.
The commission officials said about 30 political parties have submitted application seeking registration for their parties following a recent statement of the chief election commissioner, Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad.
Talking to a group of reporters, Kazi Rakibuddin said the political parties willing to get registered with the Election Commission can apply for registration any time as it is an ongoing process.  
He, however, said the EC would inform through mass media specifying the deadline for applying for registration before the next general election.
But election commissioner Md Zabed Ali said the commission was ‘not in a hurry to give registration to the political parties as it has some other important preoccupation.’
‘It is a complex process. The commission will need to verify whether the parties seeking registration have applied following the necessary conditions. It will take time,’ said Zabed Ali.
According to the Representation of Peoples Order 1972 (amended), political parties have to fulfil three conditions of the EC to get the registration.
The conditions are : political parties will have to secure at least one seat with its electoral symbol in any parliamentary election held since the independence of Bangladesh or secure five percent of total votes cast in the constituencies in which its candidates took part in any of the aforesaid parliamentary elections or establish a functional central office, by whatever name it may be called, with a central committee (as a base for the organizing structure of the party in various administrative levels in the country), district offices in at least in one-third administrative districts, offices in at least one hundred Upazilas or Metropolitan Thana having a minimum number of two hundred voters as its members in each of them.
Election commissioner Md Shahnewaz while talking to a group of reporters said non-registered political parties will not be able to contest in the next general elections.
Seven allies of the BNP-led 18-party opposition alliance and most of the components of the ruling AL-led alliance are unlikely to qualify to contest in the next general elections as they are not registered with the EC.
It is to be noted that candidates of most of the allies of the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party took part in the 2008 general elections with the election symbols of AL and BNP.   
The parties which applied to the commission for registration include National Awami Party (NAP Bhashani), Samriddhya Bangladesh Andolan, Bangladesh Ganaseba Party and Samad Party.
Election commissioner Md Zabed Ali said the parties will have the opportunity to get registered with the commission even until a month before the election day.
Officials, however, said the commission has formed a committee headed by a joint secretary of the EC to scrutinise the applications but did not dispatch any team to verify whether the parties do have offices in the upazilas in accordance with the conditions.