On the directives of Election Commission of India, a baseline survey is being conducted in Madhya Pradesh for studying pre-election awareness level, views and behaviour of voters in the context of Vidhan Sabha elections to be held this year.
For baseline survey, two-day training for 50 master trainers got underway at the Chief Electoral Office here on Wednesday. Master trainers were apprised of finer points of baseline survey in the presence of Chief Electoral Officer Jaideep Govind and Joint Chief Electoral Officer SS Bansal. Directorate of Economics & Statistics is the nodal agency for baseline survey.
During the training, senior officers of Directorate of Economics and Statistics directed master trainers to discharge important responsibilities like elections with right earnest. They were informed that as to how they will study pre-election knowledge of voters.
They will have to find out voters' awareness level, understanding, participation and level of satisfaction. During survey, study of active participation in registration process and reasons behind low voters' turnout in previous election will also be made.
Field staff deployed in the survey work will also identify the voters' groups showing lukewarm interest in polling. During it, reach of publicity mediums for SVEEP will also be studied.
Officers informed master trainers that for fulfilling objectives of survey, suggestions will be put forth after conducting study on prescribed points so that proper decisions can be taken at the right time. On the basis of questionnaire provided by Election Commission of India, information will be collected from total 23 thousand voters in 230 Vidhan Sabha constituencies. It was informed that selection of farmers, non-farmers, labourers, teachers in rural areas and doctors, lawyers etc should be made in urban areas.
In this way, representation of all sections of society should be made in the survey.
Entire process of survey will be made under the guidance of collector at district-level through Directorate of Economics & Statistics. After selection of polling booth, work of selecting voters for the survey will be undertaken under the supervision of concerning Booth level Officer.
Trainees were informed that preliminary unit of the survey will be 10 selected voters in every Vidhan Sabha constituency. Similarly, one enumerator will be deployed at each polling booth and one nodal officer for all Vidhan Sabha constituencies in every district.
There will be two master trainers in every district who will impart training to enumerators in districts. Besides, cooperation of local NGOs, universities and government employees will also be sought for filling up questionnaire. As many as 230 election observers will also participate in the survey.
On the first day, training was imparted to master trainers of Ujjain, Indore, Bhopal, Jabalpur and Hoshangabad divisions. Master trainers of Chambal, Gwalior, Sagar, Shahdol and Rewa divisions will participate in the training on the second day on April 28.