The Election Commission of India on Tuesday transferred eight district magistrates and 12 superintendents of police in five states ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.
“The ECI today has issued transfer orders for DM, SP and DIG/IG rank officers in five states namely Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh,” read the communique issued by the poll panel on Tuesday.
The ECI said the decision was taken as part of the regular review by it during a meeting chaired by Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar along with election commissioners Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu.
Among the officials transferred include DM of Assam’s Udalguri, SP Deoghar in Jharkhand, DM of Cuttack and Jagatsinghpur in Odisha.
The poll panel said under the directive, all the transferred officials have been asked to hand over the charge to their immediate junior officer and these officers will not be assigned any election duty till completion of the general election.
The respective state governments have been directed to send a panel of names of IAS and IPS officers to it, the ECI said.
Earlier in the day, the poll panel appointed Special Observers (General and Police) in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, to ensure level playing field in the LS elections.
The ECI also appointed Special Expenditure Observers in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Odisha, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh.