HYDERABAD: AS the strongrooms are set to open for counting on the morning of May 23, the city’s election machinery gets ready to roll. On Monday, the Chief Electoral Officer, Rajat Kumar, along with senior consultant to the State from the Election Commission of India (ECI), Bhanwarlal, held an interaction session with all the District Election Officers, Returning Officers and Assistant Returning Officers.
They election officers were explained the seriousness required to conduct the counting process by strictly adhering to the ECI guidelines and instructed to not leave any scope for criticism from any quarter like candidates, agents and observers. The interaction was followed by a training session regarding the technicalities of the counting process. They were also explained about ECI’s recently-launched Suvidha Counting App for data-entry along with the counting process. The results will be declared only after feeding the data into the Suvidha portal.
In the two Hyderabad districts, District Election Officer and GHMC Commissioner, M Dana Kishore, along with Hyderabad Police Commissioner, Anjani Kumar, inspected the counting centres Monday evening. Speaking on the occasion, Dana Kishore said that all counting agents appointed by each political party will have to get their credentials verified by the police. The counting will go on till evening on May 23 due to counting of VVPATs after the EVMs and a second workshop for all counting officials and staff will be held on May 22.
Meanwhile, the Rangareddy district collector D S Lokesh Kumar Monday inspected counting centres and held a review meeting with officials, instructing them to provide separate parking lots at counting centres for officials, agents and journalists. All counting will be carried out Assembly-segment wise and the process itself will be videotaped, he said.