Punjab electoral officer asks parties to appoint booth-level agents for SIR transparency

Chandigarh, May 15 With the Election Commission of India initiating the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Punjab, Chief Electoral Officer Anindita Mitra on Friday held a meeting with representatives of registered and recognised political parties and urged them to appoint booth-level agents to ensure transparency and smooth conduct of the revision process.

At the meeting, the Chief Electoral Officer stressed that booth-level agents would play an extremely crucial role throughout the Special Intensive Revision process. Hence, the registered and recognised political parties should complete their appointments without any delay.

She said the timely deployment of booth-level agents would facilitate their training alongside booth-level officers, while ensuring regular information sharing at every stage of the exercise to maintain complete transparency.

Besides, she also asked political parties to expedite the appointment process of booth-level agent-I.

Mitra said that throughout the Special Intensive Revision process, the office of the Chief Electoral Officer will remain in continuous coordination with political parties.

The political parties were also briefed about the right to vote.

She said under the Special Intensive Revision, booth-level officers will conduct door-to-door visits from June 25 to July 24 to help fill voter forms.

For this exercise, the entire election machinery has been deployed, including 24,453 booth-level officers, 2,476 supervisors, 117 Electoral Registration Officers, and 234 Assistant Electoral Registration Officers.

She further said training of booth-level officers and other preparatory arrangements related to the Special Intensive Revision exercise will be carried out from June 15 to 24.

She said the objective of the exercise is to ensure inclusion of every eligible citizen in the electoral rolls and deletion of ineligible persons from the voter list.

The Chief Electoral Officer said that holding duplicate votes is an offence under the Constitution and is punishable by up to one year's imprisonment.

Mitra further said that 89.58 per cent of the mapping has already been completed in rural areas of the state, while 73 per cent has been completed in urban areas.

She also said a Special Intensive Revision had earlier been conducted in Punjab in 2003, and the current Special Intensive Revision exercise is being undertaken on the basis of that revision.

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