Arunachal to have simultaneous polls on April 9

ITANAGAR, March 11: Notifications for April 9 elections to the 60-member Arunachal Pradesh Assembly along with Lok Sabha polls will be issued on March 15 next, State Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Chandra Bhusan Kumar informed here today.

Arunachal Pradesh Governor Lt Gen (Retd) Nirbhay Sharma recommended dissolution of the State Assembly on March 6 after accepting the recommendation of the State Cabinet which demanded holding of State elections.

The tenure of the 60-member Arunachal Assembly ends on November 4 this year.

“Notification for the simultaneous polls will be issued on March 15 and last date for filing nominations has been fixed on March 22 next,” Kumar told a press conference here.

While scrutiny of papers would be conducted on March 24, the last date of withdrawal of candidature has been fixed on March 26 next, he disclosed.

He said, the Election Commission announced the date of Assembly election last night and appointed Santosh Kumar as Excise Observer to check use of liquor by political parties to woo voters during the elections. Kumar would arrive in the State on March 15 next.

“The commission has already appointed KS Dhatwalia and DM Kakadia as awareness observer for Western and Eastern Parliamentary Constituencies respectively and they are toursing all Assembly Constituencies to create awareness among the voters.

Altogether 7,53,170 electorates including 3,77,272 female would exercise their franchise in 2,158 polling stations in the State.

664 polling stations in the State are inaccessible while 8 polling stations are having less than 10 voters, 20 having less than 20 voters and 105 polling stations have less than 50 electors. The C Sector polling station at Itanagar has the highest number of 1,650 voters, while Malogaon polling station under Hayuliang in Anjaw district has only two voters, he said.

In 100 polling stations web casting of polling process would be made available while 1,500 video and digital cameras would be used during the election, Kumar disclosed.

Two electronic voting machines (EVMs) would be used in each polling station for Assembly and Parliamentary polls separately, while one stand-by EVM would be kept in those booths where there is no road connectivity.

“The provision for NOTA (none of the above) will be available in all the EVMs,” he informed and added that the commission has chalked out multi-pronged strategies to check vote capturing.

“We have submitted a proposal of Rs 50 lakh to the commission as election expenditure for both the polls as on date and likely to submit another proposal for more fund after examination,” Kumar disclosed and added that the Commission has enhanced the expenditure limit to Rs 54 lakh for a candidate contesting Lok Sabha polls and Rs 20 lakh for candidates of Assembly polls.

The CEO informed that more than 15,000 government employees were being deployed to conduct the elections besides, 13 senior officers have been appointed EVMs as State Nodal Officers.

“Central paramilitary force will be deployed throughout the State for creating conducive environment in addition to the State’s security forces,” he disclosed.

He said, the commission was focusing to check all kinds of inducements including cash, liquor and gift by any political parties.

He said, adequate number of general observers, police observers and expenditure observers were being deployed in the State who, would be coming from outside the State and would remain in the concerned district till declaration of the result.

On movement of poll personnel and materials to inaccessible polling stations, he stated that movement would be done in advance and enough air sorties have been requisitioned for transportation of men and materials.

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