EC issues guidelines for counting of votes on June 4

Vijayawada: The Election Commission has issued a set of guidelines as Andhra Pradesh gears up for counting of votes scheduled to be held on June 4.

Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar along with the two election commissioners Ganesh Kumar and Dr Sukhbir Singh virtually reviewed the arrangements being made for counting of votes from New Delhi on Monday with chief electoral officers, returning officers and district election officers from states where elections were held in five phases.

The CEC called for proper care with regard to crowd management at the strong rooms where the EVMs will be brought on the day of counting and laid stress to keep power backup and fire safety equipment ready in addition to keeping ambulances to provide helathcare services in case of emergency.

He called for providing advance training to the personnel to be engaged for counting of polled votes in the EVMs and advised the CEOs to keep trained personnel along with equipment like computers, printers, scanners and other IT related appliances.

With regard to handling of EVMs on the day of counting, the CEC underscored the importance of careful handling of EVMs while counting the votes and asked to mark them with ‘Completion of Counting’ once such exercise was over and to seal them and secure them. He cautioned not to move the EVMs in a haphazard manner and called for proper conduct of Electronic Transfer of Postal Ballot Management System by arranging the tables and scanners for counting of votes.

On announcement of results during the counting votes, the CEC advised the CEOs and others to avoid any delay as the results trickle out and directed them to set up display boards so that the poll results could be announced as and when they were out.

AP chief electoral officer Mukesh Kumar Meena and CEOs of Arunachal Pradesh, Odisha and Sikkim where elections were held for the Assemblies in five phases and ROs and DEOs from 543 parliamentary constituencies and other officials attended the meeting.