Can carry phones but not use them at booths

Voters casting vote in the Lok Sabha elections in Dakshina Kannada on April 17 can take their cell phones to the polling stations but they should not use them, said Returning Officer A.B. Ibrahim.

Addressing presspersons here on Tuesday, he said voters should not receive calls or make calls inside the polling stations or on its premises.

He said that political parties should not hold any press conferences or issue press releases on April 16 in connection with the election campaign.

Using the Integrated Voice Recording System (IVRS) the Election Commission would keep in touch with the presiding officers across the State. Under this system the presiding officers would get calls at 7 a.m., at 1 p.m. and at 6 p.m. to know the voting percentage across the State.

He said that there were 1,766 polling stations at 992 locations in the constituency. Of them, 213 stations have all women polling staff excluding security personnel.

As many as 8,108 polling staff, including 4,652 women will be on duty at polling stations on Thursday. In addition there would be 1,800 Group D employees, police and supervisory staff would be on duty.

Special Correspondent from Udupi reports:

Returning Officer for Udupi-Chikmagalur Muddu Mohan said that preparations for the election were in the final stages in the constituency.

Mr. Mohan said on Tuesday that there are 13,86,515 voters in the constituency. As many as 19,791 new voters had been included in the electoral rolls and they had been provided with Elector’s Photo Identity Cards (EPICs). The officials of polling stations had distributed voter’s slips to 99 per cent of voters.

The voters with EPICs could find out their polling station by texting to 9243355223. They should type KAEPIC leave a space and type the EPIC number.

Except for the polling officials, no other person could take their mobile telephone into the polling stations.

A total of 9,312 government employees would be overseeing the polling process in the Udupi-Chikmagalur constituency including 4,806 in Udupi district and 4,506 in Chikmagalur district.