19K cops deployed as state votes today

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 13

The voting process of elections to eight municipal corporations and 109 municipal councils and municipal panchayats will be held from 8 am to 4 pm on Sunday. All arrangements have been put in place by the administration.

An official spokesperson for the commission said 30 IAS/PCS officers had been deputed as observers to conduct free and fair electins. Apart from this,IG/DIG-level officers had also been appointed as police observers.

IPS Mukhwinder Singh Chinna has been deputed as the observer for SAS Nagar, Roopnagar and Fatehgarh Sahib; Surjit Singh for Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Gurdaspur and Pathankot; Baljit Singh Rathore for Bathinda, Mansa and Faridkot; Surinder Kumar Kalia for Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Kapurthala and SBS Nagar.

The spokesperson said Harbaz Singh had been selected as the observer for Ferozepur, Muktsar, Moga and Fazilka; and Gurinder Singh Dhillon for Patiala, Ludhiana, Barnala and Sangrur. He said the voting would be conducted on electronic voting machines (EVMs) and 7,000 EVMs had been arranged for the purpose. He said the commission had appointed 20,510 employees for uninterrupted voting. Around 19,000 police personnel had also been deputed to conduct free and fair elections.

The spokesperson said 9,222 candidates were in the fray in 2,302 wards. The commission had set up 4,102 polling stations for these elections, of which 1,708 were sensitive and 861 hypersensitive.

The State Election Commission announced that February 14 and 17 would be dry days. The counting of votes would start at 9 am on February 17.

33 Patiala booths hypersensitive

Patiala: The district administration of Patiala has deputed 1,800 police officials along with four SP-level officers and eight DSP-level officers in all four municipal council areas. Police officials said 33 polling booths out of 190 in Rajpura, Samana, Nabha and Patran had been earmarked as hypersensitive and 50 sensitive.