After a major overhaul of the electoral rolls, the Election Commission (EC) in India is now focussing on a new software aimed at checking malpractices by polling personnel.
In the past, there have been allegations about polling officials manipulating votes. Opposition parties have often complained about polling personnel being handpicked from the CPI(M)-backed Coordination Committee of State Government employees.
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Now, the new software, developed by the National Informatics Centre (NIC), is expected to plug the holes in deployment of polling personnel. It has already been sent to the returning officers in the State, including the Chief Electoral Officer, with detailed directions on how to use it.
So far, the process of selecting and training officials for poll duty was done manually. The polling teams were usually picked about 20 days ahead of the polls. So, the officials would know their postings and team members well ahead of the poll date. This led to allegations of the ruling party manipulating the team constitution as per its ground requirements.
But as per the new software, the list of all polling staff will be sent to the EC well in advance. Each staff will be allotted a PIN number. After a three-phase training of the polling staff is over, the teams will be selected at random with the help of the software. This will be done in the presence of the poll observer, district election officer and returning officer.
The random selection list will be kept in a sealed packet, which will be opened only a day before the polls in the presence of the poll observer. So the staff will only be informed about their area of posting a day before the polls. Similarly, they will only come to know about their other team members a day ahead of the polls.
Source:Express India.
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