In a crucial development, senior officials from the Election Commission (EC) convened a meeting with Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) and police officers of eight northeastern states and West Bengal. The focus of the meeting was a thorough review of the ongoing special summary revision (SSR) of electoral rolls and preparations for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in 2024.
The meeting, held on Monday, involved detailed discussions between senior EC officials and CEOs and police officers from Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, Meghalaya, Sikkim, and West Bengal.
Tripura Chief Electoral Officer Puneet Agarwal reported that the EC officials sought the perspectives of CEOs and police officers. The senior EC officials, including Dharmendra Sharma, Nitesh Kumar Vyas, Hirdesh Kumar, Neeta Verma, Pankaj Srivastava, and Deepali Masirkar, provided advice and suggestions regarding the necessary steps and formalities leading up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Presentations were made by the CEOs and state police nodal officers on the ongoing SSR of electoral rolls. The discussions covered planning and preparations for the 18th Lok Sabha elections.
The EC officials apprised attendees in Guwahati about potential steps related to law and order, voter enrollment efforts, ensuring minimum facilities at polling stations, other polling infrastructure, and the manpower required in the nine states.
Emphasizing the need for error-free and inclusive electoral rolls, the EC team directed CEOs to involve all stakeholders, including political parties. Special attention was urged for the enrollment of vulnerable groups, such as tribal communities, transgender individuals, sex workers, scheduled caste/scheduled tribes, persons with disabilities, citizens over 80 years of age, and other identified vulnerable groups.
The EC officials stressed the optimal use of various IT applications and urged states’ police nodal officers to take time-bound initiatives to ensure free, fair, transparent, and safe polls.
This meeting in Guwahati marked the third regional conference-cum-review meeting on the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, covering nine states. Previous sessions were conducted in Chandigarh and Chennai on October 31 and November 9, respectively, encompassing a total of 16 states and Union Territories.
