The State election authority, the Chief Electoral Officer, has requested the Election Commission to allot 276 companies of Central Armed Police Forces to the State for peaceful conduct of the forthcoming elections to Lok Sabha.
CEO Rajat Kumar in a letter addressed to EC Principal Secretary Sumit Mukherjee, wanted the EC to ensure allotment of the required number of personnel for making effective bandobust arrangements for the conduct of the forthcoming polls in a free and fair manner. The EC had allotted 279 companies of Central forces during the recent Assembly elections against the 295 companies requested.
The requirement would be in addition to the deployment of personnel from the State police force and officials are in a dilemma over requisitioning forces from other States as they too are poll bound. The election authority is understood to have communicated its request to the EC in advance so as to ensure that the personnel allocated to the State could be deployed, especially in the areas known for the presence of left wing extremism, for keeping a close watch over these areas much ahead of the actual polling day. Plans for deployment of adequate forces had been necessitated as little over 10,000 of the 34,600 polling stations are identified as critical. A majority of these critical polling stations are located in seven districts where there is presence of left wing extremist activities as notified by the Union Home Ministry.
