Voters to get info online

By J.R.PRASAD

Hyderabad, Feb. 20: Voters will soon get to know their polling station and serial number by taking a look atwww.ceo.andhra.nic.in, the chief electoral officer’s website.

One need not wait till agents of political parties come knocking with polling slips and can instead take a printout of these details from the Web.

The Chief Electoral Officer, Mr I.V.Subba Rao, said that the facility would be set up in a week. “I held discussions with the officials of National Informatics Centre on this today,” he said.

The Election Commission is developing special software to enable the voter to get these details at the click of a mouse.

According to Mr Subba Rao, voter enrolment centres set up at every tahsildar office are being networked with the main server in the CEO’s office in Hyderabad to enable this facility.

Meanwhile, in a bid to keep a tab on violators of the model code of conduct, the EC is going to appoint 714 observers across the state.

“We will appoint two observers for every Assembly segment and three for every Lok Sabha constituency,” said Mr Subba Rao. “They will keenly watch the movements of the candidates during campaigning.”

The EC has also asked district collectors to prepare a list of sensitive polling stations across the state so as to appoint micro-level observers to ensure free and fair polls.

On February 21 and 22, the EC will hold final booth level meetings at every polling booth across the state, in which about 70,000 polling agents of all parties would take part and verify the veracity of the voters’ list.

“In these meetings, every citizen can walk into the polling booth and verify whether his or her name is included in the voters’ list,” said Mr Subba Rao. “If it is not there, they can submit fresh applications. This is the last chance.”