JAMMU, AUG 8: Nearly one lakh Kashmiri Pandit migrants will be exercising their franchise in exile for the fourth time since 1996, as the Chief Election Commission is all set to extend them the facility of postal ballot once again.Official sources told this paper that a formal notification to this effect is being issued soon by the CEC. However, the facility will be similar to that extended to migrants during the Lok Sabha polls held in the State during 1998.Significantly, this is being done despite claims by both the Centre and the state government about considerable improvement in law and order situation ever since the holding of assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir during September 1996. The postal ballot scheme, enabling Kashmiri migrants cast vote in their respective constituencies in troubled Kashmir Valley from their present residences elsewhere in the country, was initially introduced during the May 1996 LS elections. It was, however, extended during the assembly polls in September1996.The National Conference, which came to power after the assembly polls, however, failed to persuade return of Kashmiri migrants to their native places in view of continued militant killings in the Valley. As a result, they were again allowed to cast their vote by post during the LS polls in 1998.This time too, sources said that the same postal ballot facility is being extended to migrants, as they would not come back home in view of spurt in militant activities.All the six LS constituencies in the State are going to polls in three phases from September 5 onwards. While polling is scheduled to be held in Ladakh and Srinagar LS constituencies on September 5, it will take place in Udhampur and Jammu on September 11. The remaining two Lok Sabha constituencies of Baramulla and Anantnag will go to polls on September 18. About the postal ballot scheme, sources said that like last LS elections, the postal ballot will be delivered to migrant voters at places of their living by the election staffpersonally. This will be done after their proper identification on the basis of the particulars mentioned in the previous electoral rolls as these have not been revised this time.To ensure that these ballot papers are received by the Returning Officer in time for counting along with other votes polled in the respective LS constituencies, special letter boxes will be kept at places having concentration of Kashmiri migrants, sources said. Apart from this, special arrangements would also be made to sort out these ballot papers and carry them to the respective constituencies in the Valley.About 95,000 to 98,000 Kashmiri migrant voters were staying in different parts of the country, sources said. Pointing out that there will be no separate electoral rolls for them, sources said that the Assistant Returning Officers (AROs) along with other staff will be deployed at places having concentration of migrant voters for on the spot delivery and receipt of ballot papers from them.However, the number of AROs andother staff on election duty will vary from place to place depending upon the number of migrant voters living there.
