Political parties should appoint booth level agents: Khiyangate

Ranchi: Chief Electoral Officer L Khiyangate held a review meeting with all the district electoral officers of the North and South
Chota Nagpur divisions of the state during issues of model code of conduct law and order monitoring of election expenses and
other preparations related to elections was discussed.

During the review, Mr Khiyangate said that as per the directions of the Election Commission of India all political parties have to appoint booth level agents and asked the officials to inform the same to the political parties in their respective meetings with them. I asked all the district electoral officer to ensure that the processing of forms on the net by the area returning officer should be done by March 20 after which only under form 6 new names in the electoral list would be added.

He also asked the officials to dispose of all the pending cases related to voter identity cards and also as to provide training to the booth level officer for their empowerment. He also asked the district electoral officers to send a daily report on sweep, model code of conduct, complaint redressal, nomination rules and law and order situation on a timely basis and also update the same on the dashboard. Mr Khiyangate also stressed on the need to keep an eye on paid news and collected necessary information regarding preparations which have been made in this regard.

The officials said that an adequate number of staff have been hired and newspapers published in Hindi, English and other languages are being taken in which election-related news are being reviewed and their record is being kept. Apart from that an adequate number of television sets have been also put up to keep an eye on the news. The CEO also collected information related to the control room which is being set up and askes to hold a review of the log book. He also said that report related to media accredit and monitoring committee be also sent every Saturday.

He said that that the report related to poll expenditure made by the candidate has to be given to the expenditure observer and asked the district electoral officers to make preparations before in this regard so that they can be provided the same on time and also asked them to form the district electoral expense monitoring committee.

Mr Khiyangate also directed to ensure that as per law action should be taken on the cases of violation of model code and conduct and stressed on the fact for making the video surveillance team more trained and his trust that the video recording Team should clearly record the name of the incident type date place name of the political party and the candidate and said that videography should be in such a manner so that the cost in organising the program can be estimated therefore the items used in the program including vehicles their registration number pandals chairs table loudspeaker hoardings posters etc should also be clearly video recorded.

He also asked the district electoral officers to form the static surveillance team in which as per need personal of the central armed forces be kept along with the magistrate policeman and videographer. Additional Chief electoral officer Vinay Kumar Choubey and Manish Ranjan who were also present on the location also gave necessary instructions to the district electoral officers.

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