General Election: ‘Shadow Registers’ To Keep Tabs on Expenditure

General Election: ‘Shadow Registers’ To Keep Tabs on Expenditure

GUWAHATI: The District Election Officer under the supervision of Election Expenditure Observers (EEOs) will maintain ‘Shadow Registers’ in the names of all candidates to note down their poll-related expenditure. These shadow registers will be tallied with the receipt and expenditure details that would be submitted by the candidates to the State Election Department after the polls. Discrepancies, if any, will be brought to the notice of the Election Commission of India (ECI). The limit of expenditure for each candidate during the general election is Rs 70 lakh. This was stated by Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), Assam, Mukesh Chandra Sahu while interacting with the media here on Monday.

Dwelling on the requirement of each candidate to maintain details of his/her poll-related money receipts and expenditure, the CEO added, “The candidates will have to open individual bank accounts for their respective poll-related money receipts and expenditure. They will have to show the bank account details to the EEOs thrice during the election time. Besides, the candidates will also have to maintain expense registers.”

To ensure free-and-fair polls, ‘General Observers’, ‘Election Expenditure Observers’, and ‘Police Observers’ would be deployed across Assam by the ECI during the Parliamentary polls. While the ‘General Observers’ would be keeping an eagle eye on the overall activities of the political parties and the candidates with reference to the Model Code of Conduct (MCC), the EEOs would be keeping a tab on the receipt and expenditure details of each candidate during the run-up to the general election. On the other hand, the Police Observers would be constantly reviewing the security arrangements across the State during the election time.

CEO Sahu further said, “The security requirements for the polls have been under constant review of the State police and the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA). Already, 35 companies of security forces have reached the State. More would be arriving shortly. The requirement would be the same as was requisitioned during the 2014 general election.”

When asked about the possibilities of names correction in voters’ list now, CEO Sahu said, “The concerned persons can fill up and submit Form-8 even now.” He also stated that “people can still apply for the electors’ photo identity cards (EPICs).”

The name-correction, as well as name-inclusion processes in the photo electoral roll, will be possible till the last date of filing of nomination papers by the candidates. To ensure masses’ participation in the voting process, awareness campaigns across the State with the motto ‘No voters to be left out’ have been carried out.

During the programme, the CEO also released five video and audio clips under SVEEP (Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation).

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