On the day the gazette notification was released on April 18, the Andhra Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Mukesh Kumar Meena said about 5 lakh people would be handling the poll process in the State.
In a freewheeling talk with The Hindu’s Appaji Reddem and Sambasiva Rao M, the CEO said that the Election Commission of India (ECI) considers A.P. one of the highly sensitive States. About 2,000 squads are in place to check the flow of cash, liquor, and other freebies illegally into the State, he said.
The CEO says that the ECI is on regular watch and has served notices to different persons ranging from the ground-level staff to the Chief Minister. Here are the excerpts.
It’s the day of the gazette notification release; the statutory process and nomination filing are initiated today. At the outset, what measures are taken by the Election Commission to ensure free and fair polling?
The actual constitutional process is beginning today with the gazette notification. We are fully ready with the men, material and machinery. The whole State, district and Assembly-level master trainers are prepared. Today, our Returning Officers are sitting in the 175 Assembly constituencies and 25 Lok Sabha constituencies, expecting the contestants to file the nominations till 3 p.m. I was told that the 19th (April) is a good day and so is the 22nd, and I expect a maximum number of nominations in those days.
Have you identified any critical constituencies and polling stations in the State? How are they handled?
Andhra Pradesh has been seen by the Election Commission as a very sensitive State in terms of political management. From the beginning, the EC has been watching it. The first round of meetings by the Commission was held last August; then they came again in December, and once again, the entire full Commission came and held a review on 8th and 9th of January.
AP was the first State where the full Commission went and had a review on the poll preparedness. Besides, there is a regular watch on the State and three special observers were appointed.
From December onwards, we’ve started the identification of critical polling stations based on different criteria. We have identified over 12,050 polling stations that fall under the category of critical polling stations. The number is about ⅓ of the total polling stations in the State.
This apart, post nomination, the candidates are also given an opportunity to give the worry list (the stations where the candidate anticipates manipulation or violence) which would be considered by the Collector. The final figure of critical polling stations will come by this month end.
As per the guidelines of the EC, security will be provided by the CAPF (Central Armed Police Force). For the non-Naxalite area critical polling station, there will be half a section of the CAPF force (4 to 5 people), and it will be one section of the force for the naxal area or the area of Left Wing Extremism. In addition, there will be local police support.
The second thing is that all the critical polling stations will have webcasting. This time, we have two cameras, both inside the polling station and outside, to check queue lines and surrounding areas. The video links will also be given to the District Collector, CEO office, and Election Commission of India. So, the entire activity will be watched and recorded. This apart, there will be a micro observer who would be reporting any anomaly.
A lot of cash, liquor, and other related material was caught in the State. How substantial is it, and how is it monitored?
By the time the elections were announced, there was about ₹180 crore worth of cash and liquor was seized. After the announcement of the polls, to date, we have seized ₹120 crore worth cash, liquor, metals and freebies, which would include ₹32 crore cash, ₹15 crore worth liquor, ₹2 crore worth of drugs, ₹59 crore worth of metals and ₹12 crore worth of freebies.
We’ve been very vigilant, and A.P. is identified as one of the States where huge amounts of cash and freebies are distributed. Over 600 flying squads and 250 checkposts on the State and district borders are on the job. Apart from that, there are over 550 static teams and others for the purpose. In all, there are over 2,000 teams acting on the complaints received through different sources.
Besides, the Commission is ensuring that no un-authorised liquor comes out of breweries, distilleries and storage godowns. Cameras are placed in all these places and we will start getting the feed starting from a couple of days from now.
The Election Commission sitting here handles such a complex exercise. How many people are involved in handling all these activities?
As we know, this is a huge man-management exercise. There are 3.3 lakh people required for polling, including reserves. Almost 4 lakh people are there for border check posts, flying squads, polling, monitoring, control room, data and static teams, etc. There is an estimated 1.4 lakh police force besides there will be 300 companies (30,000 people) of CAPF. There will be around 5 lakh people working for the purpose of elections in this State for that period.
What’s the role of volunteers in the State? Are they involved in any polling activity? What will be their role? Will there be any problem in the distribution of pensions in their absence?
Volunteers are not government employees, and their role is restricted to providing services at the field level. Based on the complaints, the EC has directed that they should not be involved in any election activity. So, the EC has totally banned them from election activity. For distribution of pensions, government was asked to arrange an alternative which was taken care of. Physically challenged people will be provided a pension at the doorstep, and others are asked to collect it at the local office.
There are complaints from a couple of political parties about the government officials taking sides and the EC took action. There were also complaints about top officials such as Chief Secretary and DGP as well. How do you view it?
EC is verifying the complaints and facts. Six IPS officers and three IAS officers were removed and one official from excise department was shifted out. Regarding the other higher officials, the EC has already taken the report and it will act upon it shortly.
The ECI has a special watch on the State and deployed special observers. Lot of complaints from stake holders. And there was lot of cash and liquor flow. Violance should be controlled by SPs, failing which suitable action will be taken. We have already sensitized all the district officers, and we have given a message by transferring certain people.
After a couple of incidents, I called the Superintendents of Police (SPs) and told them that they either have to control the situation or have to face the consequences from the people. There is equal treatment for all. Regarding MCC violations and other violence, 126 FIRs against TDP, 136 against YSRCP, and 76 against other parties have been filed. Immediate action has been taken wherever the incident happened.
My direction to all the officers is follow the rules. Behave in the manner, which evokes confidence among people.
For leaders, we request the political leaders that the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) is something that everybody has to fall in line with, right from top to bottom.
What is your expectation on voters’ turnout? Will it be more or less in the current polls?
In Andhra Pradesh, the general voting percentage is about 79 percent, but we targeted to increase to 82 percent this time. Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur, Kurnool, Paderu and others have lesser voting percentage. We hope that the polling percentage would be more than 80 percent this time.
What’s the avenue for a common man to reach ECI when there is a violation?
There is a mechanism of the c-VIGIL. Till date we received more than 12,000. But, in some places, the usage is low.
We request all the people to use it. We have a general toll free number is 1950 for any election related complaints.
