The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Tuesday asked its officials, including CEOs and DEOs, to work transparently following the existing legal framework and be approachable and responsive to political parties.
Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar issued the direction during his address on the first day of the two-day conference of the CEOs of all States/UTs, in presence of Election Commissioners (ECs) Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi at the India International Institute of Democracy and Election Management here.
Notably, this is the first such conference to be held since Kumar assumed charge as the CEC.
During the conference, the CEC exhorted all officials, including all the CEOs, DEOs, EROs, and BLOs, across the country to work transparently and fulfill all statutory obligations diligently and as per the existing legal framework i.e. the RP Act 1950 and 1951, Registration of Elector Rules 1960, Conduct of Election Rules 1961 and the instructions issued by ECI from time to time.
Calling upon the officials to be approachable and responsive to political parties, Kumar said all party meetings at all statutory levels be held regularly to resolve any issues within the existing statutory framework by the concerned competent authority i.e. ERO or DEO or CEO.
He said the issue-wise action taken report by each CEO is to be submitted by March 31 to their concerned DEC.
The CEC emphasised that all CEOs, DEOs, ROs, and EROs should be thorough with their roles and responsibilities, as clearly delineated within the statute and ECI instructions.
He said that officials should ensure that all citizens of India who are above 18 years of age are registered as electors as per Article 325 and Article 326 of the Constitution. All BLOs should be trained to be courteous with electors while ensuring that no electoral staff or officer is intimidated by anyone using false claims.
The officials were also asked to make efforts to ensure that each polling booth has between 800 and 1200 electors and the polling booth within 2 km distance from the residence of each elector. Besides, the polling booths with proper assured minimum facilities (AMF) should be established for the ease of voting in rural areas, and polling booths be established in high rise buildings as well as slum clusters to increase voting in urban areas.
The conference aims to strengthen the capacity building of each of the 28 identified stakeholders which have been divided among all CEOs in four cohorts namely Electoral Rolls, Conduct of Elections, Supervisory/Enforcement and Political Parties/Candidates, under the guidance of each of the four DECs in the Commission.