Journalism of Courage
With political parties in Uttar Pradesh gearing up for the 2017 assembly polls, the Election Commission of India too will begin its process of initiating basic exercises required for the polls.
Exercises such as deletion of duplicate names from the electoral roll, their integration and rationalisation of polling booths will be undertaken by the poll panel from April next year.
Explaining the exercises, UP Chief Electoral Officer Arun Singhal told The Indian Express, “The commission will identify duplicate voters which will be in accordance with the booth-level officers who too will verify the duplicate names in all 403 assembly segments.”
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It should be noted that a summary revision currently under way across the country is also identifying duplicate voters. A draft of the updated electoral roll will be published on January 11.
In the following exercise, the EC will rationalise polling booths so as to increase their numbers (along with polling centres) to cater to the additional “seven lakh voters”, as per the commission’s estimate, by January 11.
Under the integration exercise, names of all voters in a family will be brought together and the family would be allotted the same polling booth.
Exercises to identify “sensitive” polling stations and assess the requirement of central forces during the polls will also be carried out.
Singhal said the EC will later announce the schedule for a special summary revision to include in the electoral roll those voters who will attain the age of 18 in January 2017.
