At Rs 71.7 crore, seizures 20 times more than 2018 elections: CEO
Narcotics highest at Rs 32.65 crore; home voting new feature this election
Shillong, Feb 25: The level of seizures in the run-up to this Assembly elections has been 20 times more than the last state polls in 2018, Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Frederick Roy Kharkongor has said.
Kharkongor said there were seizures worth Rs 71.77 crore till February 23 and narcotics have been the highest at Rs 32.65 crore.
“Besides, precious metals worth Rs 191 lakh (Rs 1.91 crore), cash worth Rs 8.4 crore and liquor worth Rs 12.47 crore have been seized till February 23. Other things make up the remaining (amount),” he told Meghalaya Monitor.
According to the CEO, the high level of seizures could be possible owing to coordinated efforts of the state and central enforcement agencies, overall supervision and extensive monitoring by the state election office and sharing of intelligence.
The state goes to polls on February 27 and election campaigning ends at 4 pm on February 25. There will be 3,482 polling stations, of which about 60% will be covered by webcasting.
One unique feature of this election will be voting from home that will help senior citizens and persons with disabilities. “For this, we have received 3,553 applications from senior citizens over 80 years of age and 1,807 applications from PwDs. This is the first time that we will have home voting and our personnel will travel to all these houses,” said Kharkongor.
About EVMs, Kharkongor asserted that all the machines are under strict surveillance in 13 strong rooms across the state. “One thing to remember is that machines can malfunction but it is different from manipulation. If any machine develops any problem, we will replace it,” he added.
For the 181 polling stations bordering Assam, the administration of respective districts along the borders have been coordinating and there have been two chief secretary-level meetings in Shillong and Guwahati, informed Kharkongor.
