Chennai: Unexpected brief showers in Chennai on Thursday morning caused a flutter among the representatives of political parties camping inside the Anna University premises to keep a watch over the strong rooms in which the polled Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) from South Chennai Lok Sabha constituency are kept as they found two of the total 215 cameras conking out on Thursday.
With the party representatives, who keep a round the clock vigil in all the counter centre premises by coming on shifts, raising an alarm, the authorities replaced the two faulty cameras and explained that the rains had caused the problem and that it was rectified immediately, assuring them that there was no security lapse otherwise.
Later in the day, the Chief Electoral Officer, Sathyabrata Sahoo, held a video conference with the District Election Officers / Returning Officers, Commissioners of Police, Superintendents of Police, District level Engineers of PWD (Civil and Electrical) to review the arrangements relating to EVM strong room security, over all security at the counting centers, monitoring of security by CCTV installations and other related matters with regard to the General Election to Lok Sabha 2024.
An official press release said, ‘As per the instructions of ECI, the contesting candidates or their representatives are allowed to watch the security arrangements of the Strong Room through the CCTV display facility provided at the counting centres. The CCTV cameras were already fixed on the outside of every Strong Room Door having the polled EVMs,’
Besides, the entire counting center was under general surveillance by adequate number of CCTV cameras and to ensure uninterrupted coverage, all the DEOs/ROs were instructed on May 2 to make arrangements for fixing of one additional CCTV camera in front of the door of each Strong Room with a separate dedicated line, switch, router, NVR and TV for political party agents to view the footage even if there was failure in the other CCTV cameras fixed in front of strong room door, it said.
Instructions had been issued to the DEOs to coordinate with Electricity Department and PWD officials to ensure uninterrupted power supply for CCTV facilities in the counting centers and availability of diesel generator with automatic change over provision in case of power failure and UPS backup for strong room CCTV cameras to ensure seamless watching, it said.
Also they had been instructed to have a stabiliser for CCTV installation to avoid voltage fluctuations. DEOs had also been instructed to ensure that measures like surge protector/lightning arrester were installed so that the CCTV cameras do not get affected because of lightning, it said.
‘As per the existing directions of the ECI, the candidates or the representatives of the candidates based on their requests, accompany the DEO/RO/ARO to the inner perimeter, in batches, to see, verify and satisfy regarding strong room security. A Three-tier cordoning system comprising Central Armed Police Forces, State Armed police and local police has been set up with controlled access in all counting premises to prevent any entry of unauthorized persons,’ it added.
