By-polls were held at the ACs of Kadi and Visavadar in Gujarat, Nilambur in Kerala, Ludhiana West in Punjab and Kaliganj in West Bengal on Thursday
New Delhi: From mobile deposit facility to upgraded VTR sharing process and 100 per cent webcasting of polling stations -- the by-polls to five Assembly Constituencies (ACs) held on Thursday witnessed successful implementation of several major new initiatives launched by the Election Commission of India (ECI) in the past four months.
By-polls were held at the ACs of Kadi and Visavadar in Gujarat, Nilambur in Kerala, Ludhiana West in Punjab and Kaliganj in West Bengal on Thursday. During these by-polls, polling was held at 1354 Polling Stations (PS) in the five ACs.
The new initiatives include the provision of mobile deposit facility for the electors at all polling stations, upgraded Voter Turnout sharing process resulting in faster updation of the approximate polling trends by ensuring that the Presiding Officer updates the VTR data at the close of poll before leaving the polling station, webcasting of polling stations ensuring constant vigil of the entire polling process and individual mock poll training of all Presiding Officers. Also, Special Summary Revision (SSR) of the Electoral Rolls was conducted before the by-polls for the first time in nearly two decades.
“The successful implementation of these measures in the by-polls paves the way for full introduction of all these measures in the forthcoming Bihar Assembly elections,” ECI said.
The upgraded VTR sharing process was successfully implemented where the Presiding Officer of each polling station was able to directly enter voter turnout on the new ECINET App every two hours on polling day in order to reduce the time lag in the updation of the approximate polling trends. This was automatically aggregated at the constituency level. The approximate voting percentage trends were published every two hours as before. Also, voter turnout data was entered into the ECINET by Presiding Officers immediately after the close of poll, before they left the polling station to ensure that the approximate percentage of votes polled would be available on the updated VTR App constituency-wise after the close of polls subject to network connectivity, ECI said.
Previously, voter turnout data was collected manually by Sector Officers and relayed to Returning Officers (ROs) via phone calls, SMS, or messaging apps. This information was aggregated every two hours and uploaded to the Voter Turnout (VTR) App. At the close of poll, the Presiding Officer used to update the final VTR data after completing all other statutory responsibilities like filling up of various forms including 17C where he would take the signatures of the polling agents of political parties/candidates and hand over a copy to them, sealing and safe depositing of the EVMs in the strong room as per laid down procedures etc.
Thus, the polling percentage trends were often updated hours later, around 10-11 PM, based on physical records arriving late in the night or even the next day.
