Bengal voter slips to carry photos

KOLKATA - In a new initiative, the Election Commission has decided to issue voter slips containing photographs and carrying detailed personal information on the electors for the coming West Bengal assembly poll, said an official Thursday.

For the first time, we are going to issue voter slips with photographs of the voters. It will also include voters’ name and sex and his or her guardian’s name,” West Bengal Additional Chief Electoral Officer N.K. Sahana told mediapersons here.

“Besides, the name and number of his or her assembly constituency, polling station serial number and electoral photo identity card (EPIC) number will also be mentioned in it, Sahana said.

We will distribute it ourselves. Booth Level Officials (BLO) are likely to be engaged to distribute it to the voters after visiting their houses. However, this slip will not be accepted as an identification document and bringing it in the polling station is not compulsory, said Sahana.

The slips are being issued for the convenience of the voters to help them find their polling booths. It will also help the polling officers to locate the voters enlisted in the electoral rolls,” the official said.

On an average, 982 voters can exercise their franchise in the stipulated 10 hours of poll. If the voters’ slips help in reducing the time taken in tallying the voters’ particulars mentioned in the electoral roll with that in the EPIC, more votes can be cast in the 10-hour period, said Sahana.

Meanwhile, a proposal has been forwarded to the Election Commission from the state office to shift 856 polling stations across the state.

After physical verification of more than 51,000 main polling stations, we found the infrastructure of 856 polling stations was not adequate and we proposed to the Election Commission to shift them, he said.

He also said a deviation has been made in the new directives issued by the EC in the modified candidate expenditure monitoring guidelines.

After the meeting with senior election officials and income tax and exercise department officials, the EC’s Director General (Expenditure Monitoring) P.K. Dash has extended the directive of setting up flying squads at police station level to sub-divisional level.

Earlier, the EC had directed setting up of flying squads in all police stations to track movement of illegal cash used during campaigning by candidates.

Now the squads will be set up at the sub-division level, whereas a static cash surveillance team will be posted at all police stations, said Sahana.