First phase of panchayat elections in Dibrugarh on December 5

Dibrugarh: Along with many districts of the State, Dibrugarh too will hold the first phase of panchayat elections on December 5. Announcing the date at a press meet held on Wednesday, DC Laya Madduri said that the district administration was making adequate arrangements for the successful conduct of the elections. She added that the elections would be conducted for 23 zila parishads, 7 anchalik panchayats, 93 village panchayats and 930 wards. There will be a total number of 1,055 voting centres in the district, out of which 674 were designated as comparatively safe, 331 sensitive and 50 hyper sensitive. Madduri also informed that the last date for the candidates to file their nominations was November 15, date of verification of nominations and announcing the list of eligible candidates was November 16 and that of withdrawal of nominations was November 19.

Further, the final list of candidates standing for elections would also be made public on November 19, she said. Moreover, if the elections were to be held again due to any reason, December 7 has been earmarked for it, besides keeping December 12 as the date of counting of votes. Stating that the district administration would consider every complaint relating to the violation of the model code of conduct of elections with utmost seriousness, Madduri informed that Circle Officers and Block Development Officers had been instructed to be wary of such incidents, if any, in their respective areas.

ADC (Elections) Sushanta Kumar Dutta shed light on the limit of expenditure pertaining to election campaigns, as prescribed by the State Election Commission. Under it, the limit for the office of member of Gaon Panchayat was Rs 15,000; that of Anchalik Panchayat was Rs 1, 60,000; for the office of president of Gaon Panchayat was Rs 1, 60, 000; and for the post of Zila Parishad member was Rs 6, 40, 000. Present on the occasion, ASP Nityaranjan Chutia said that adequate measures were taken by the police administration to withstand any law-and-order situation that might arise during the elections.

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