Chief electoral Officer (CEO) of Tripura, Sriram Tarinikanta on Friday said as many as 47 new polling stations have been created for voters’ convenience and the Election Commission of India (CEI) has already approved of the same.
He said this during an interactive session with the media at Agartala on Friday.
He also informed the number of polling booths has been increased from 3170 to 3214 following an exercise carried out by the State Election Department.
An average distance between polling booths and voters has been reduced to around two km which was around four km in some areas, he further said.
The CEO also apprised that a candidate, who will contest the ensuing Tripura Assembly elections 2018, can spend a maximum limit of Rs 20 lakh.
However, there will be no upper limit for a party contesting the state polls, but it will have to keep financial statement of expenditure in prescribed way laid down by the Election Commission of India.
Claiming that preparation of final photo electoral rolls has been making good progress, the CEO said all the complaints are being verified for taking proper steps. “In course of revision of electoral rolls, 28,000 names of voters were deleted after carrying out proper exercise. Of the total deleted voters, 21,000 are dead while remaining 7000 are on various grounds that include shifted voters too”, he pointed out.
On the facilities for those who are living beyond the Indo-Bangla fencing, the CEO said there will be all out efforts ensure that voters having EPIC could cast their votes.
On possible intimidation from across the border, Taranikanta said, “We had a meeting with BSF authorities, where overall situation along the border was reviewed. There was nothing to worry but BSF jawans will provide fool-proof security to prevent any kind of attempts to disturb the peace”.