Jhabua Assembly by-poll on October 21

The Election Commission of India has declared that by-election for Jhabua Assembly seat will be held on October 21. The last date to file nominations is September 30. The nominations would be scrutinised on October 1 and last date for withdrawal of candidature is October 3. The polling will be held on October 21 and results would be announced on October 24. Informing about the election schedule for Jhabua by-poll, Chief Electoral Officer V L Kantarao told that model code of conduct has come into effect immediately in Jhabua constituency. He said that there 356 polling centres. Jhabua is having 322 voting centres while 34 voting centres are situated in Alirajpur.

The number of voters is 2,76,982, including 1,37,882 male and 1,39,097 female, and 3 voters from third gender. The availability of EVMs is satisfactory. The voting percentage during last assembly election in Jhabua was 65.26. In Lok Sabha elections, Jhabua’s vote percentage was 70.80. He said that with the declaration of election schedule, Model Code of Conduct has come into force in Jhabua and Alirajpur. Under Model Code of Conduct, no minister either from Centre and State could do government tour and any tour of minister in election bound area would be totally personally.

If any minister is on government tour and passing through election bound district then he will not halt in district and nor will attend any political programme. He said that with the imposition of Model Code of Conduct, now the Election Commission will keep close eye on expenditure and will focus on vehicle checking. Answering to a question, he said that commission will seek information about critical and sensitive polling stations from district collector and SP. He said that there is adequate force available but then also one additional central force would be sought. There is no prohibition on survey work being done to assess the losses but construction activities are prohibited.