The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Election officials ready for Assembly polls

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Sunday, Mar 30, 2008
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Election officials ready for Assembly polls

Special Correspondent

Announcement of dates expected in a few days

There are four crore voters in the State
65 per cent of voters have photo cards

BANGALORE: The stage is set for the Legislative Assembly elections in the State with the election authorities here publishing the final list of electoral rolls as per the redrawn constituencies for all the 224 Assembly constituencies in the State on Saturday. As per the final list, the State had an electorate of four crore (1.97 crore women).

State Chief Electoral Officer R. Ramaseshan told presspersons here on Saturday that deputy commissioners in the districts and the municipal authorities in urban areas who had been vested with election related responsibilities would now undertake the work of issuing photo identity cards to all those who sought one.

As per an estimate, nearly 65 per cent of the voters had identity cards. Possession of an identity card would not ensure a right to vote unless the person concerned was a registered voter and his or her name figured in the electoral rolls. Sources in the Election Commission indicated that it was now only a matter of time before the election calendar was announced. Chief Election Commissioner N.Gopalaswami had said that the election schedule would be announced in two or three days.

Mr. Ramaseshan said: “We have completed our work and have met the deadline prescribed by the Election Commission. It is now for the commission to finalise the election dates”. The State election authorities commenced the work on delimitation of constituencies afresh and the preparation of electoral rolls on February 23. While the work relating to Mandya district was completed in three days, the work relating to the remaining districts and the urban areas had been completed as per schedule. Karnataka is the first State in the country to publish the latest electoral rolls after the delimitation of constituencies. This was because Assembly elections have to be held before the May 28 deadline. President’s rule was imposed in the State on November 20, 2007.

Eligible voters whose names did not figure in the electoral rolls can seek inclusion of their names in the prescribed format and the deadline for this will be the last date for withdrawal of nominations after the election schedule is announced.

Apart from the offices of the deputy commissioners, tahsildars and other officials connected with election work, the electoral rolls can be viewed on the Election Commission’s website — www.ceo.kar.nic.in.

The jurisdiction of the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike and the Bangalore Urban district put together have the largest number of 66 lakh voters in the State while Kodagu with two Assembly constituencies is the smallest with 3.5 lakh voters. The BBMP and the urban district together had 28 constituencies while earlier they had only 16 constituencies.

Bangalore city in the 2004 Assembly elections had only 12 constituencies. Mr. Ramaseshan said electronic voting machines would be used in all the 40,000-odd polling stations. The authorities had about 65,000 voting machines although the requirement was around 50,000. A total of 2.5 lakh personnel would be required for conducting the elections and this was apart from the police personnel who would be on duty to oversee the security arrangements.

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Karnataka