Vijayapura: The District Administration has made elaborate arrangements for the City Corporation election being held for the first time after the Vijayapura City Municipal Corporation getting upgraded to Corporation about nine years ago.
The elections could not be held for various reasons including some legal tussles. But now the State Election Commission has finally announced the dates for the polls.
“The notification for the election be issued on Monday October 10, the day the model code of conduct will come into place. The last date for filing of nomination papers will be October 17, the last date for withdrawal of the nomination papers is October 20 and the polls will be held on October 28. The counting would be held on October 31,” said Deputy Commissioner Vijaymahantesh Danammanavar.
Addressing mediapersons about the polling preparations on Friday October 7, he said that polling will be held for 35 wards of the City where some 294173 voters can exercise their franchise.
Of the total voters, 146736 male, 147327 female voters and 110 are others. The District Administration has set up 303 polling booths in the City. The counting will be held at Darbar High School of the City.
Informing about the reservation category, he said that of the total 35 wards, 18 have been reserved for general category, of them nine each of general and women. Two reserved for Backward Classes (B) in that, one each for general and female candidates, nine seats reserved for Backward Classes (A), in that five for general and four for women, one seat reserved for ST General and five seats for SC, in that three for General and two for Women Reserved.
The SEC has fixed the deposit of Rs. 5,000 for General Category candidates and Rs. 2500 for all other candidates. The maximum limit for election expenditure of each candidate has been fixed at Rs. 3 lakh. The team of officials has been constituted to monitor the poll expenses of the candidate.
EVMs would be used for polling, however VVPATs would not be used, said Danammanavar.
A total of 1454 officials to be deployed for polling duty, he said.
With regard to police security during the elections, Superintendent of Police, H. D. Anand Kumar said that around 700 police staff would be deployed for the polling duty. Besides them, four battalions of KSRP and eight platoons of District Armed Reserve Police would be posted for the duty to ensure peaceful polling. He said that based on the sensitivity of the wards, of the total 303 booths, some 37 booths have been identified as hyper sensitive and 80 as sensitive.
“The District Police is ready to work in coordination with the Excise Department to ensure free and fair polling,” he said.
Additional Deputy Commissioner, and Ramesh Kalasad were also present.
