Dates for Assembly elections in five states – Uttar Pradesh, Goa, Manipur, Punjab, and Uttarakhand – were announced Saturday afternoon.
Uttar Pradesh will vote in seven phases – on February 10, February 14, February 20, February 23, February 27, March 3 and March 7.
Punjab, Goa, and Uttarakhand will all vote in one phase on February 14.
Manipur will vote on March 3.
Counting of votes will be on March 10.
Out of these 5 poll-bound states, the BJP is in power in 4 states including Goa, Manipur, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh.
Amid rising COVID-19 cases, the EC has halted physical rallies till January 15. A review will be held after that. No victory marches or the like will be allowed after the election results are declared.
No public meetings will be held between 8 am and 8 pm and door to door campaigning has to be limited to five or less people.
In light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, polling time will be increased by an hour for all five state elections
The CEC said that all polling officials will be considered frontline workers and would correspondingly be inoculated with a third precautionary dose in the days to come.
It is mandatory for political parties to upload on their website detailed information regarding individuals with pending criminal cases selected as poll candidates. They will also have to give a reason to select the candidate
Senior citizens above 80 years of age, persons with disabilities and COVID19 patients can vote by postal ballot. Voters can also make use of the Suvidha and PWD apps. The CEC also spoke about the cVIGIL, uring people to make use of the platform to eradicate malpractices.
Around 60% of polling stations are covered by webcast
A total of 18.34 crore electors including service voters will take part in this election out of which 8.55 crore are women electors, said CEC Sushil Chandra.
24.9 lakh first-time electors are registered in the 5 States including Uttar Pradesh.
The number of people per polling station have also been reduced. All stations remain less than 1000 and the CEC said that it would ensure a “good experience” for voters. 1620 polling stations will be manned completely by women. Several others will be manned wholly by disabled individuals.
The EC said that there were three broad areas of focus, namely the COVID-19 restrictions, hassle-free elections and maximum voter participation. The final electoral role was recently published with updates up to January 1, 2022. As COVID cases soared in view of Omicron variant, ECI held meetings with Union Health Secretary and Home Secretary, experts, and health secretaries of States. After taking these views and ground situation, ECI decided to announce polls with safety norms in place, said CEC Sushil Chandra.
