Vijayawada: The state election commissioner Anil Chandra Punetha has called for the conduct of urban local body elections in a free, fair, peaceful and transparent manner in the state on November 1.
The SEC, along with commission secretary Mallikarjuna and municipal administration commissioner Raja Kumari held a video conference with municipal commissioner Sampath Kumar and district collectors, election observers, police commissioners, DIGs and SPs here on Friday to review the poll arrangements.
The election commissioner noted that several complaints were received during the initial days of the election process and there was poll-related violence in seven districts. Contestants faced trouble to file their nomination papers there. In some cases, he said, they were even denied the opportunity to enter the fray. In some cases, pressure was mounted on the polling officials, he said.
He directed the DGP, district collectors, police commissioners and SPs to initiate necessary action in relation to all such complaints.
Punetha laid stress on the holding of elections in an impartial manner and called for an inquiry soon after receiving complaints on electoral malpractices and irregularities. “All records related to the election process should be subject to legal scrutiny,” he said, and advised those having objections to approach the election tribunal. He felt the need to initiate preventive measures to contain violence at the time of polling.
SEC secretary Mallikarjuna called upon the officials to pay more attention to the polling stations that are declared as sensitive, hyper sensitive and critical and install CCTV cameras both inside and outside, while also ensuring privacy to the voters to cast their votes in the voting compartment.
He called for preparation of a plan of action for every polling station with regard to its number, total number of voters, basic amenities, security arrangements and so on by keeping in mind the days of polling, re-polling and counting of votes.
The secretary called for compliance with protocol while handling ballot boxes from polling stations to reception centres to strong rooms. The entire exercise in every stage would be video recorded and be also under CCTV surveillance. The ‘silence period’ before 48 hours of polling must be strictly implemented with no poll campaign allowed. Curbs should be imposed on the sale of liquor.
As for counting of votes, he said the counting would start at 8am with postal ballots first and the counting would be completed before 8pm followed by the announcement of the results.
IG Raja Kumari called for foolproof security arrangements to avoid any untoward incident at the time of polling and felt the need to deploy striking forces, special striking forces and special forces in a strategic manner. The police, she said, would maintain high alert to avoid proxy voting, impersonation and other electoral malpractices.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: deccanchronicle.com
