Dhaka: The newly formed six-member search body on Saturday requested 31 registered political parties, including Bangladesh Awami League and Bangladesh Nationalist Party, to propose five names including an Election Commission chief and members to the additional secretary of the cabinet division by 31 January.

The search committee headed by Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain held its maiden meeting at the Supreme Court Judges' Lounge in Dhaka at about 11:00am on Saturday, said cabinet secretary Md. Shafiul Alam.                                      

The secretary also said the search committee will sit hold a meeting with 12 eminent personalities of Bangladesh civil society at the SC Judges’ Lounge on Monday at 4:00pm,

Earlier, search committee member and judge of Appellate Division of Bangladesh Supreme Court Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain presided over the meeting. Other members of the body — High Court Division judge Justice Obaidul Hassan, Comptroller and Auditor General of Bangladesh Masud Ahmed, Chairman of Bangladesh Public Service Commission (BPSC) Dr Muhammed Sadique, Pro Vice-Chancellor of Chittagong University (CU) Prof Dr Shireen Akhter and Dhaka University (DU) English Department teacher Prof Dr Syed Manzoorul Islam — were present at the meeting.                                    

Bangladesh president formed the search body on 25 January after holding series of dialog with the political parties.

President Abdul Hamid held a month-long dialogue with political parties on the formation of a new Election Commission (EC). The talks ended on January 18.     

Earlier, President Hamid held talks with 31 political parties, including ruling Awami League, BNP and Jatiya Party (Ershad).   

During the talks, the political parties separately placed a series of proposals and most of them proposed enacting a law for the EC formation.