To keep a hawk eye and ensure free and fair elections in the state, the Himachal Pradesh Election Commission will this time webcast polling process live by covering 10 per cent of the polling booths.

The webcasting enables live smooth streaming of audio and video.

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To bring about transparency, the office of the CEO has been converted into a power centre that would monitor the polling process in the distant polling stations.

Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Devesh Kumar said around 10 per cent of the total 7,730 polling booths in the state was being covered in these elections through webcasting.

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By Saturday evening, 772 polling booths were covered and after trial runs.

These polling booths have been placed under CCTV surveillance to keep a vigil on the polling process.

The trials that were being run in the afternoon had even some of the polling booths of the tribal belts that include Kinnaur successfully connected.

Assistance has been sought from Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) which is the nodal agency, said Sharma.

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Although webcasting was initiated in 2017 state assembly polls, however, the webcasting was unsuccessful owing to some technical snag, according to sources.

What has hampered the election commission in achieving 100 per cent webcasting is the poor internet connectivity in Himachal.

The webcasting enables video viewing and surveillance by the teams deployed by the election commission across the state, which would monitor all the poll activities inside the polling booths on the voting day.

Himachal is voting today to elect its four Lok Sabha MPs.

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