The Hindu : Exercise your franchise, voters told

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Mar 14, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Thanjavur

Exercise your franchise, voters told

By Our Staff Reporter

THANJAVUR, MARCH 13 . Voters in the district will be sensitised to exercise their franchise in the coming Lok Sabha elections, the Collector, S. Kosalaraman, said today.

He told presspersons that improving the polling percentage was one of the aims of the Election Commission, and people should make it a point of voting.

The revised voters' list was released, but the enrolment of those who completed 18 years would go on. Those whose names were left out in the list could apply afresh. A total of 1,694 Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) would be used in the district, at the rate of a machine for a booth. As many as 2,400 EVMs were kept ready to tackle any emergency.

Officials would demonstrate the use of EVMs to voters. The Revenue department officials at the level of Deputy Collectors and Tasildhars, were already trained, and they would in turn train the Assistant Tasildhars and other officials at the block level.

The district had 10 assembly constituencies. Pattukottai and Peravurani were under the Pudukottai Lok Sabha constituency, and Kumbakonam and Thiruvidaimaruthur under the Mayiladuthurai Lok Sabha constituency. The Thanjavur Lok Sabha constituency included the Orathanadu, Thanjavur, Thiruvonam, Thiruviyaru, Papanasam and Valangaiman Assembly segments.

In all, the district had an electorate of 17,39,103 (8,51,474 men and 8,87,629 women). The Thanjavur Lok Sabha constituency had 10,28,011 voters (5,02,651 men and 5,25, 360 women).

There were 1,694 polling booths in the district. Of this, 1,632 were common booths (meant for men and women), 31 were meant for men and another 31 for women.

Representatives of political parties today gave an assurance to the Thanjavur Collector, S. Kosalaraman, that they will remove the graffiti drawn on the walls of government buildings and bridges within a week.

They were taking part in an all-party meeting held at the Collectorate here to discuss poll preparations and the code of conduct.

The Collector asked the parties to erase the graffiti drawn on the walls of the Rajah Mirasudhar Government Hospital and the railway station and bridges.

Mr. Kosalaraman also urged the representatives to motivate voters to exercise their franchise. Representatives of the political parties, he said, would be trained in the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs). A committee comprising officials and representatives of political parties would be formed to ensure smooth conduct of the Lok Sabha polls. The parties could telephone No. 04362-230857 to convey any information.

The AIADMK general council member, M. Rengasamy, the BJP district secretary, V. Vinayagam, the DMK district secretary, T. Selvam, the CPI secretary, A. Chidambaram, Neelamegam of the CPI (M), Nanji K. Varadarajan of the Congress, Singh Ramachandran of the MDMK, K. Alayamani of the PMK, and K. Thangaiyan of the Bahujan Samaj Party took part in the meeting.

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