Postal voting of personnel drafted for poll duty begins

On duty:Police personnel casting postal votes at a facilitation centre in Puducherry on Monday.— Photo: T. Singaravelou

Apart from police personnel, 698 student volunteers will cast their ballot

The postal voting for police personnel involved in the election process and first time voters who have been drafted for election duty began at the postal ballot facilitation centre here on Monday.

District Election Officer and Collector P. Jawahar said the Elections Department had set up postal ballot facilitation centre at the Vivekananda Higher Secondary School in Sellaperumalpet for 3,695 police personnel involved in election duty. A large number of police personnel cast their votes at the centre from 9 a.m. on Monday.

Form 12 was issued to every police personnel who had applied for the postal ballot. Arrangements are also being made for the postal ballots to be received by the Department of Posts.

Mr. Jawahar who visited the facilitation centre said the facility would help the police on election duty cast their vote. Arrangements have been made to receive postal ballots from police personnel at the centre from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Tuesday.

In addition, as many as 698 first time voters and student volunteers drafted for election duty are also expected to cast their votes at the facilitation centre.

The second round of training for government staff including presiding officers involved in election duty was held from May 5 to 8. Out of 3,382 officials eligible for casting postal ballots, as many as 2,578 were given Form 12 and the ballot papers during the second round of training while the remaining have decided to send their ballots through posts.

All the postal ballots will be segregated Returning Officer wise and it will be sent to the concerned ROs.

The postal ballot votes would be counted before counting of votes in the EVMs on May 19.