Quite disappointing
Tripura gears up for Lok Sabha elections 2024; 150 polling stations identified ‘vulnerable’ in West constituency
Tripura has begun preparations to ensure peaceful voting in Lok Sabha elections 2024 as the state will go into polls in the first two phases — on April 19 and April 26.
The state has two Lok Sabha seats: Tripura West and Tripura East, both of which are held by the BJP. The West Lok Sabha constituency and the bypoll to the Ramnagar Assembly constituency will be held simultaneously on April 19, followed by the poll at Tripura East on April 26.
Speaking to reporters at Agartala, District Election Officer Dr Vishal Kumar and West Tripura Superintendent of Police Kiran Kumar said 793 polling stations would be set up in the West Tripura Parliamentary constituency, out of which 150 have been identified as “vulnerable”. He said that in each constituency, one or two polling stations will be model polling stations, one or two will be women-based, and one or two will be young men-based.
The security assessment reveals that 14 companies of security forces are available right now, and “double” the current strength of security personnel or “more” than the current availability is expected to arrive soon. A similar security assessment exercise is also being done in the East Tripura Parliamentary constituency, though the final assessment reports are yet to come
Dr Kumar also appealed to the voters to take part in the voting and to the young voters to vote for their winning candidate in the maximum number. “We expect to get good support from police, central paramilitary forces, and support from other forces like the Income Tax department. With their support and the support of people and political parties, we shall be successful in conducting an impartial and peaceful poll”, the official said.
A total of 14,61,836 electorates have been enrolled for the West Lok Sabha constituency, among whom 7,33,645 are male voters, 7,28,315 females, and 58 are transgenders. Besides, 5,920 service voters, including 5,808 males, 112 females and 7,818 people with disability, have also been enrolled. He added that 15-20 per cent more physically challenged voters have been enrolled since the last Assembly polls.
He added that of the total 45,669 voters in the Ramnagar constituency, 23,629 are females and 22,040 are males. The seat fell vacant following the death of BJP MLA Surajit Dutta in December.
Dr Kumar said that the notification for the polling at West constituency and the Ramnagar bypoll would be released on March 20, and all preparations have been underway since the announcement of the polls.
“We shall complete training of the polling personnel within the given timeframe. The time period is sufficient. All the preparations are forward looking. Training sessions of returning officers, assistant returning officers, sector officers were already done and polling personnel will be trained in a few days,” added the official.
The first level of checking of electronic voting machines was done, and in a few days, the officials would start commissioning the EVMs.
Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar on Saturday announced that the polling for Lok Sabha elections 2024 would be held across India in seven phases from April 19 to June 1 and the counting of votes on June 4.
Debraj Deb – 2024-03-17 16:25