CEO Rajat Kumar has focussed attention on ellection issues

 Telangana | Written by : Suryaa Desk Updated: Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 12:37 PM

The State election authority, the Chief Electoral Officer, has intensified efforts to adequately train the officials to be posted on election duties with the date for the announcement of schedule for the General Elections fast approaching.

CEO Rajat Kumar has focussed attention on issues like the vacant district election officers and returning officers posts and took the issue to the notice of Chief Secretary S.K. Joshi on Wednesday. During the hour-long meeting, the CEO explained to the Chief Secretary that the vacancies of DEOs in districts like Hyderabad and Vikarabad and the proposed changes in returning officers of some constituencies need to be expedited as the training for these officials was scheduled at New Delhi on February 20 and 21.

The CEO launched a two-day training programme for election officials, including those at the State and the district levels, for training them on various aspects of election management. In addition to explaining about the finer details involved in the successful conduct of the elections, a written test was also conducted for the officials to assess their level of understanding of various aspects including expenditure monitoring, electoral roll preparation and preparation of the ASD (absent, shifted, deletion) lists.

Poll preparedness

The State election authority also briefed the Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora who made a transit halt in the city on Wednesday. The CEC, according to Mr. Rajat Kumar, enquired about the poll preparedness in the State and sought details about the works relating to electoral roll revision and vulnerability mapping.

Asked about the complaints that were aired by political parties during the recently concluded Assembly elections, he said the error rate was less than one %. “As many as 35,000 presiding officers were pressed into service of which, less than 200 failed to adhere to the prescribed norms,” he said adding efforts were underway to ensure that human failure was brought to the minimal levels by the time the elections to Lok Sabha were held.