The Hindu : Kerala News : All set for counting of votes

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Kerala

Kerala

All set for counting of votes

Staff Reporter

Counting will begin at 14 centres in the district at 8 a.m. on Thursday

KOCHI: All arrangements have been made in the district for Thursday's counting of votes polled for the Assembly elections, according to District Collector A.P.M. Mohammed Hanish.

The counting will begin at 14 centres at 8 a.m. The votes in the electronic voting machines will be counted after the counting of the postal ballots is over. Counting will be held in 14 tables at each round.

Election Observers will be present at all the counting centres in all constituencies. A total of 1,120 employees have been deputed for counting of votes. The election control room in the Collectorate has been linked through hotline with all counting centres. The control room will also be the headquarters of the District Election Officer.

The Collector inspected the arrangements made at the control room and the Media Centre for the counting. He was accompanied by Additional District Magistrate Johnson K.George and Deputy Collector (Election) P.K. Nalan.

A total of 92 candidates are contesting in 14 constituencies in the district. The highest number of candidates is in Thripunithura constituency while Kunnathunadu and Mattancherry have the lowest number, with four candidates each.

Out of the total number of 21,01,387 voters in the district, 14,99,207 voters cast their votes this time. There were 7,75,840 men and 7,23,367 women. In 12 constituencies, there were more male voters than female voters. At Paravur and Vadakkekara, women outnumbered the men.

Facilities at Media Centre

All facilities have been made at the Media Centre for informing the public about the results of the elections as the counting progresses on Thursday.

Results from all the 140 constituencies in the State will be displayed on the screen arranged at the Media Centre. Loudspeakers have also been arranged at the Collectorate compound to inform the public about the results. The Kerala State Electronics Development Corporation (KELTRON) is in charge of maintaining the communication network between the counting centres, Election Commission office and District Headquarters as well as the Media Centres. National Informatics Centre has prepared the software for this facility.

The computer network at all the 14 counting centres in the district has been put in place. The trial run from various centres too have started.

Counting of votes using electronic-voting machines is an easy procedure. Just by pressing the Result button in the control unit of the machine, in the presence of the candidates and agents, the result will appear on the screen.

At first, the display channel will show the total number of votes polled, followed by the votes that each candidate got.

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