Technology will be used extensively in the Lok Sabha elections, leaving no scope for the contesting candidates to violate model code of conduct and under report their election expenditure, Chief Electoral Officer, Haryana, Rajeev Ranjan said on Saturday.
Presiding over a meeting of District Electoral Officers of six districts — Gurugram, Mahendragarh, Sonepat, Jhajjar, Rewari and Rohtak, and officials associated with election duty at Gurugram, he said that cVigil App is being used for the first time in the election through which any person can upload photos or videos of any candidate or political party violating code of conduct or committing any other irregularities. Complaints received on the cVigil app will be attended by the authorities concerned within 100 minutes.
He said this will prepare strong evidence which can be presented in court against the candidates violating model code of conduct. The CEO said that in addition to the cVigil app, the vehicles of Sector Supervisors will be GPS enabled and wherever they go, their location can be seen. This time, the Sector Supervisors have been given the responsibility to change the faulty VVPAT machines and the Electronic Voting Machines besides they will also check the polling stations and ensure that all polling parties have arrived safely at their booth a day before polling.
During voting, they will keep a check in their allotted area and wherever they will notice any violation, they will immediately click photographs or make videos and send it to the Election Commission of India. They will also send voting percentage reports every hour. With the use of technology, conviction will be easier in the cases registered during elections and it will be easy to register candidates' election expenditure.
The CEO directed all the officials to strictly maintain the election expenditure of candidates and use shadow register from day one to start maintaining election expenditure of each candidate.
Ranjan said if any candidate takes a vehicle permit, they should start maintaining expenditure of that vehicle from the first day, whether it is being used or not.
The Chief Electoral Officer also directed the officers to adopt measures to increase the voting percentage and said that Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) activities could be implemented for it. He said a comprehensive plan should be adopted to increase the voting percentage and eligible candidates, who have not yet made their vote, can be made aware that they can apply for preparing their vote latest by April 12 up to 3 p.m.
Referring to the service voters, he said this is 94,000 at present and this should go to over one lakh. He said training would be imparted to Record Officers in Ambala Cantonment on Monday. It was informed in the meeting that the soldiers serving in the army and their families can apply online on the service voter portal to get their vote made. Their application should be forwarded through the Record Officers, else it will not be accepted. The application should have signature and stamp of the Record Officer, he added.
