D-Day: 5,800 polling staff to man booths

Aakanksha N Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, December 16

The last day before the elections saw preparations for the D-Day. The polling staff reached their respective stations at around 10 in the morning to get to know their booth numbers. EVM machines were also taken to the booths. A total of 5,800 staff members will be manning the elections, of which 2,800 are police personnel.

It was a different kind of day in all seven stations from where the EVMs were distributed for the booths. In Hansraj Stadium and Government Model School Ladovali Road, teachers and employees of the electricity board were present among others who have got the poll duty.

Many of them were also raising their issues with their respective returning officers. One of the teachers, while talking to The Tribune, said that at her booth all four staff members were women whereas the administration generally deployed a male staff too. She said that it would be difficult for them in case of any emergency.

A polling party deployed at a booth constitutes of presiding officers, assistant presiding officer and other two staff members. A fleet of buses were also stationed outside the centres to take them to their respective booths with the machines.

At every station, two or three staff members to train the presiding officers on EVMs were also sitting while the polling staff was coming to them to clear their queries.

The training staff, which included mostly teachers, said it was a tough task as on the election day. According to the administration officials, multi-tier security arrangements for ensuring totally free, fair, peaceful, credible and transparent elections have been made.

As many as 2,800 cops and 3,000 polling staff will be there on the election duty. As many as 1,700 police officers have been posted at 265 polling stations and 554 polling booths. Police Commissioner Praveen Sinha said more that 30 barricades (nakas) would be installed in the city. Sinha said, “As many as 37 patrolling parties will regularly keep a check.”

Likewise, he said that 20 reserve parties with a strength of around 205 cops had been constituted for rushing them in case of any sort of urgency. He added that apart from it, 12 police stations of the city had been assigned equal number of assistant commissioners of police (ACPs), who would lead the police parties with an Inspector-rank officer and other staff during the poling.

Deputy Commissioner (DC) Varinder Sharma and the police commissioner visited Junior Model School on Ladowali road, Raizada Hansraj Stadium and KMV College to inspect the entire process of distribution of the material to the polling staff. During the inspection spanning more than three hours, the officers minutely looked into all the arrangements involving the election process. They asked the polling staff to ensure that people were able to exercise their franchise in a fair manner.

Meanwhile, the polling staff said they should get incentives for the election duty. “Unlike previous elections, we have not been told that what will be given to us for the duty this time,” one of the teachers said. Not only this, no arrangements were made for us during any of our training sessions.