New Delhi, April 21
The Election Commission today ordered repoll at 283 polling stations in nine states, where polling in the first phase of the for the Lok Sabha elections was marred by large-scale disturbances.
Senior officials say the EC may also order repolling at more than 100 polling stations each in Bihar and Jharkhand and will arrive at a decision in this regard either late in the night or tomorrow, when all reports have been obtained from returning officers.
The repolling will take place over the next 10 days.
Repolling has been ordered at 117 polling stations in Manipur, 70 in Karnataka, 30 in Assam, 23 in Andhra Pradesh, 21 in Chhattisgarh, 19 in Orissa, two in Gujarat and one each in Jammu and Kashmir and Meghalaya.
The repolling at 12 polling stations in Manipur will be held tomorrow, while 20 polling stations will see repolling on April 24 and the remaining 85 on April 30.
In Chhattisgarh, repolling has been ordered at 21 polling stations. While at two polling stations in the Kanker parliamentary constituency repolling will be held tomorrow, at 19 other polling stations in Bastar, it will be held on April 23. Tomorrow, repolling will be held at 30 polling stations in Assam, 23 in Andhra Pradesh, 19 in Orissa, 12 in Manipur, two in Gujarat and one each in Jammu and Kashmir and Meghalaya.
No repoll will take place in
Maharashtra, Andaman and Nicobar, Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli, which had also gone to elections yesterday.
Meanwhile, the commission has directed the Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) of various states to ensure that voters are not harassed for minor discrepancies in their electoral identity cards and are allowed to cast their votes.
The presiding officers should ignore minor discrepancies in the entries relating to voter’s name, father’s/mother’s/husband’s name, sex, age or address in the identity cards and allow them to vote so long as the identity of the voter can be established by means of that card, the EC has said in a circular to the CEOs.
All voters, who have been issued identity cards, will have to produce their cards for exercising their franchise, it has said.
Identity cards issued by the electoral registration officer of another assembly constituency will also be accepted by the presiding officers, provided the name of the voter finds place in the electoral roll pertaining to the polling station where the elector has turned up for voting.
Those who have not been issued identity cards should bring any of the alternative documents prescribed by the commission.
The Commission today ordered immediate transfer of the Superintendent of Police and the Deputy Superintendent of Police of Baghpat in Uttar Pradesh, from where former Union Minister and Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Ajit Singh was contesting, following some complaints.
Mr Vir Bahadur Singh and Mr Rajinder Singh Malik were ordered to be shifted to non-election related work by the poll panel, EC sources said.
