Sirsi: Election officials have put in place all arrangements required for the smooth conduct of the assembly election in Sirsi-Siddapura constituency. Voting will be held on May 12.
The constituency consists of 264 polling booths, of which 64 are sensitive and 31 hypersensitive polling stations. More than 1,300 polling officials have been deputed for the purpose.
Officials from coastal areas have come to Sirsi-Siddapura constituency, while officials from this constituency have gone to Bhatkal, Karwar, Kumta and Haliyal.
The administration has arranged for buses to these officials and they have started plying to these destinations from 5:30 am.
Officials were reintroduced to the EVMs and VVPAT machines. Each polling station will have a team of five members officials along with required number of police officials for security.
There are as many as 1,90,741 voters in the constituency. Briefing reporters on Friday, Election Officer Rajashekar Dambal said all procedures have been followed to conduct free and fair elections in a conducive atmosphere.
This is for the first time that two-polling stations in the constituency has been identified as pink booths and one physically challenged friendly polling booths.
The administration has also made sure that special attraction have been placed there to attract more voters. First aid will also be provided at the polling stations, he said.
However, there were few women, especially those with small children, polling officials who expressed their anguish over them being deployed on election duty.
“In spite of requesting several times, officials concerned did not permit us to skip election duty, as there are small kids that we have to look after. It is also difficult to stay in polling booths along with kids in the night,” said one of the polling officials who has had to attend the polling duty as it was compulsory.
As security precaution the election commission has deployed police officials along with railway protection force, SSB, BSF, para-military, home guards and others.