ISLAMABAD, Dec 25: The local bodies' election, for which electoral rolls are being updated, are likely to cost the Election Commission over Rs1 billion compared to Rs800 million spent on the polls in 2001, sources said.

Estimates prepared by the Election Commission cite inflation as the main reason for the escalation of cost of the 2005 local government elections likely to begin in March or April, they said.

They said Rs80 million would be spent on training of election staff.

They said Rs700 million was spent on holding the October 2002 general election.

The commission would soon submit a request to the finance ministry to release the funds through a supplementary grant.

The local bodies' election in 2001 was held in five phases.

There are 132,000 members of 6,332 union councils in the country.

The number of voters registered for the elections was 72 million, including 500,000 who had registered with the commission in the ongoing updating of electoral rolls, the sources said.

If the government decided to hold local bodies' elections in cantonment areas as announced by the National Reconstruction Bureau, the number of voters would increase and the provincial governments would have to demarcate the constituencies once again, the sources said.

So far the Election Commission had not received any official direction to make arrangements to hold the elections in cantonments, they said.