Follow EC guidelines poll officials told

Kakinada: All officials connected to holding of elections should follow the Election Commission of India (ECI) guidelines in strict accordance, said East Godavari Collector Kartikeya Mishra. Addressing newly appointed returning officers and assistant returning officers of various constituencies who joined duties a few days ago on transfer to EG district from other districts here on Wednesday, the Collector said that the election officials should settle the Form 18 claims received for Graduates Constituency in East and West Godavari districts by Thursday evening.

The Collector also directed them to visit the polling stations and keep the ballot boxes ready for polling. Identification of distribution centres, reception centres and strong rooms for storing ballot boxes is in addition to identification of auxiliary polling stations where the voter’s strength has more than 1400.With regard to general elections, the Collector directed the officials to correct the EPIC cards duplication and to settle the pending 93,000 claims received under claims and objections and to update them in ERO net.

For conducting free and fair polling, the Collector suggested a joint meeting with police and revenue officials soon.A Mallikarjuna, Joint Collector, Sumit Gandhi, Rajamahendravaram Municipal Commissioner, Saikanth Varma, Vinod Kumar, Sub-Collectors Nandini Salaria, Anantha Sekhar, DFOs, ROs and AROs attended the meeting.