Assembly polls: 41,63,367 voters to elect new Government on Oct 21

Collector Ashwin Mudgal addressing a press conference at the

collectorate on Saturday. Deputy Election Officer Rajlakshmi Shah SP (Rural) Rakesh Ola, Commissioner of Police Dr Bhushan Kumar Upadhyay and Additional District Collector Shrikant Phadke look on.

With the model code of conduct for Legislative Assembly elections in Maharashtra coming into effect on Saturday morning, the district administration has started all the necessary preparations for the major exercise. “Like previous assembly polls, the counting of votes will be held at 12 different locations and one each in every Legislative Assembly segment in the district,” said Collector Ashwin Mudgal at a press conference held at the collectorate in Civil Lines, on Saturday. There are 41,63,367 voters in Nagpur district of which 21,31,149 are male, 20,32,118 are female and 100 are third gender who will exercise their right to franchise in the assembly elections on October 21.

Total 78,527 first-time voters of Nagpur also will vote in the elections. However, 73,936 new voters between age group of 18 and 19 years will also cast vote. Election Commission of India announced the schedule for assembly polls, on Saturday stating that the elections will be held in a single phase for 288 seats while counting of votes will be on October 24. “Notification for the election will be issued on September 27 whereas the last date for filing of nominations is October 4. Scrutiny of nominations will be done on October 5 while the last date for withdrawal of nominations is October 7,” Mudgal added. Before October 27, the election process shall be completed as per the instructions of the Election Commission of India (ECI). Addressing the media, Mudgal said that election would be conducted at 4,412 polling stations in Nagpur district.

This time, 55 polling stations in the district will consider as sensitive booths that includes 7 in Saoner, 5 in Nagpur West, 4 each in Katol, Hingna, Umred, Kamptee, Ramtek, Nagpur South, Nagpur East, Nagpur Central and Nagpur North. Nagpur district has 12 Legislative Assembly constituencies -- Katol, Saoner, Hingna, Umred, Kamptee, Ramtek in rural areas; and Nagpur South-West, Nagpur South, Nagpur East, Nagpur Central, Nagpur West, Nagpur North in Nagpur city. Nagpur district has total 41,63,367 voters which includes 21,31,149 men, 20,32,118 women and 100 third gender voters. In previous Assembly elections, the total number of voters in the district was 36,58,843 including 19,06,889 men and 17,51,897 women voters. Political parties are providing their Booth-level Agents (BLA) at all booths on election day. Every booth will have two BLAs to extend their help to voters. Total 8,907 BLAs will remain present on polling booths in which 4,016 are from BJP, 3,434 are from Congress, 760 are from Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), 497 of Shiv Sena and 200 of BSP. A total of 7,721 Ballot Units and 5,515 Control Units will be used in conduct of elections.

Similarly, the administration required 5,956 Voter-verified paper audit trails (VVPAT) in which they have 5,853 VVPATs and remaining numbers will be provided by Andhra Pradesh Government. Also present at the press conference were Commissioner of Police Dr Bhushan Kumar Upadhyay, SP (Rural) Rakesh Ola, Additional District Collector Shrikant Phadke, District Deputy Election Officer Rajlakshmi Shah and other senior officials of district administration.

Special arrangements for Divyang voters In the district 11,440 Divyang voters will vote in this election. For such voters, the district administration will be providing special arrangements. Cadets of NCC, NSS and students of MSW will remain present at pooling booths to help Divyang voters. About 32 NGOs in the district also will join hands with these students. Every pooling booth in the district are on ground floor and administration will provide facilities like wheel chairs, medical facility etc. for Divyang. The NGOs will also take feedback from Divyang voters about the election process and how the administration will improve the facilities in next election.

MCMC to keep check on paid news Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC) constituted by the district administration will keep vigil over paid news during the period of model code of conduct, informed Collector. Necessary instructions have been issued to ensure briefing of political parties and media groups in the district about paid news. The committee can take action against any party and media group if they found guilty in this regard, Mudgal informed.