The State Election Commission (SEC) today announced that the elections to all 144 wards of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will take place next month, on 19 December, and the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) has come into effect from today onwards. Nomination filing starts from 25 November and would continue till 1 December.

Addressing a Press conference, the state election commissioner, Sourav Das today confirmed that the civic polls to all 144 wards of the KMC will be held on 19 December. There will be a total of 4742 main polling booths and 385 auxiliary booths. Election will take place in a total of 1707 polling premises. The total number of voters, as announced by the SEC, is 40,48,352.

Mr Das further notified that nomination filing starts today and will continue till the first of December, which is also the last day for filing it.  The time for nomination filing is from 11 am to 3 pm. This will be followed by a process of scrutiny that will take place on 2 December. The last date for withdrawal of nominations is 4 December and the date of polling is 19 December.

The election commissioner pointed out that repolling, if any, will be held on 20 December. “The election will be completed on 22 December. The date of counting will be soon confirmed” he said. It was informed that the tentative counting date is on 21 December.

The polling hours on 19 December will be from 7am to 5pm. Mr Das also pointed out that the electoral rolls of Election Commission of India that are to be used in the KMC election, is updated upto 1 December 2021 while its qualifying date is 1 January 2021. He said that electronic voting machines (EVMS) will be used in the polls.

Commenting on the security plan pertaining to the number of state or central forces that are required to be deployed outside poll booths, Mr Das said that the commission has asked for a report from the DG and chief secretary of the state which is yet to be submitted. “Once we receive that we will announce the decision regarding security” he said.

It was announced that in respect to covid protocols, no campaigns can be executed from 7pm to 10 am. This time period will be the “silence zone”. During nomination filing, only two persons can accompany the candidate. For door to door campaigns, a maximum of five persons are allowed. Additionally, Mr Das announced that a grievance management system has been launched, named “EGMS”. It is a web-based facility where anyone can lodge their complaints related to the election.