In view of the upcoming Lok Sabha general elections, Senior Deputy Election Commissioners of Election Commission of India (ECI) Dharmendra Sharma and Nitesh Vyas asked the district election officers/ district magistrates (DEOs/DMs) of 12 districts of this region including Varanasi to complete poll preparations on time. Holding a meeting with the DEOs/DMs of Varanasi, Sonbhadra, Mirzapur, Chandauli, Ghazipur, Jaunpur, Azamgarh, Mau, Ballia, Prayagraj, Amethi and Bhadohi at a meeting held here on Monday, they also reviewed the progress of preparations.
They also discussed the preparation of the voter list in the context of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, 2024. To make the voter list proper, instructions were given to all the 12 DEOs regarding registering the names of eligible voters in the voter list, removing the names of dead voters from the voter list and improving elector population (EP) and gender ratio.
In the meeting, SDECs instructed the DEOs/ DMs that efforts should be made that the name of any eligible voter is not deprived of being registered in the voter list and directed them to take efforts to register the names of young voters of 18-19 age group in the voter list. For this, they said that special camps should be organised in educational institutions like universities, technical and medical colleges, ITIs, Polytechnics etc. Besides, they also asked the DEOs/ DMs to organise regular meetings with political parties to help in purifying the voter list.
The ECI officers said that the suggestions of the political parties should also be taken and steps should also be taken to implement their suggestions after examining them on their merits and demerits. ECI Director Deepali Masirkar, Secretary Pawan Diwan, Under Secretary Prafulla Awasthi, Chief Electoral Officer, Uttar Pradesh Navdeep Rinwa along with Additional Chief Electoral Officers Nidhi Srivastava and Kumar Vineet were also present in the meeting.