Poll panel's tionwide electoral rolls 'purification' drive

AGARTALA, April 2: The Election Commission has asked all the states and union territories, except five election bound states, to launch a fresh drive to correct and update the electoral rolls, an official said here on Saturday.

“The actual work of purification of the electoral rolls under the programme ‘tiol Electoral Roll Purification and Authentication Programme (NERPAP)’ has started on Friday and it would continue till August,” Additiol Chief Electoral Officer of Tripura Debashish Modak told IANS.

He said, “NERPAP was conducted in previous year also and was effective. It will be implemented in various phases.”

The five month programme would be completed before the publication of the next draft electoral rolls of each state, he said.

The next draft electoral rolls would be published for the subsequent summary revision of voters’ list qualifying the age as on January 1, 2017, he said.

“All eligible voters with a special focus on 18 years’ age group are to be included in the electoral list and multiple registrations of a single person cleansed, while also taking care of the dead, shifted and absent voters.”

“Sometimes after the shifting of a person or a family from one place to another place and other reasons, their mes occur in two or more lists. Under NERPAP, mes and other details of the voters would be verified and recorded,” Modak said.

The election-bound states of Assam, Kerala, Tamil du, West Bengal and Puducherry have been kept outside the programme, possibly to avoid any difficulties in the ongoing electoral process.

The Election Commission is also collecting the voter’s mobile number with his EPIC (Elector’s Photo Identity Card) number to provide electoral roll related information to the voters through mobiles. (IANS)