Voting will be held in 89 constituencies in Gujarat on Saturday in the first phase of the high-stakes Assembly elections.
A total of 21.2 million voters are expected to cast their votes at 24,689 polling stations in Saurashtra and South Gujarat.
A total of 977 candidates are contesting, including Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, BJP State president Jitu Vaghani and the Congress leaders Shaktisinh Gohil, Arjun Modhvadia and Paresh Dhanani.
Voting will start at 8 a.m. and end at 6 p.m. with arrangements to ensure smooth polling in nearly 18 districts in the two regions.
Security protocols
Seeking to allay apprehensions regarding the integrity of the electronic voting machines, the Election Commission said it had put in place “an elaborate framework of system, security protocols and procedural checks” to prevent any “possible misuse” of the voting machines during the polling.
There have been widespread concerns over the integrity of voting machines with some political parties and voters asking if the machines were tamper-proof.
EC assurance
“The commission would like to reassure the people of the country that it would leave no stone unturned in preserving the integrity and credibility of the elections,” a press release said.
For the first time, the ECI is deploying voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines in all the 50,128 polling stations across the State to “inject greater transparency and credibility” to the voting process and also to allay fears regarding rigging of machines.
In the VVPAT machines attached with each EVM, a paper slip is generated bearing the name and symbol of the candidate for whom the vote has been cast and the choice will be displayed to the voter through a transparent window for seven seconds after the vote has been cast.
Mandatory checks
Moreover, the commission will conduct a mandatory verification of VVPAT paper slips of one randomly selected polling station in every Assembly constituency across the State.
“The comprehensive framework of administrative protocols and procedural safeguards consist of the ‘first-level checking’ of all EVMs and VVPATs, strict regime of mock polls conducted on every EVM and VVPAT during the first-level check, candidate setting and on poll day before the beginning of actual polls, two-stage randomisation of machines, stringent security protocols for storage of machines before, during and after the polls, and comprehensive videography and CCTV coverage of all EVM and VVPAT related activities and storage in strong-rooms,” the EC statement said.
Any malfunctioning EVMs or VVPATs found during the first-level checks were sent to the factories so that they cannot be used in the election.
“After the first-level checks, the machines are kept in a strong room under round-the-clock security and CCTV coverage.”
According to the ECI, the sequence of candidates’ names is in alphabetical order, first for national and State parties, followed by State-registered parties, and then Independents.
