With a view to ensure free and fair polls, more than 10,000 State Police and para-military personnel would be deployed in insurgency-hit Rajnandgaon district in which Assembly polls are to be held on November 11, the first phase of elections.
According to an official statement issued here on Friday, the paramilitary forces would especially be deployed in the ‘sensitive’ and ‘ultra sensitive’ polling centres, Superintendent of Police, Rajnandgaon, Sanjeev Shukla said that the district had received allocation of 80 companies of security forces for ensuring elaborate security arrangements. He said that 15 security forces companies had already been deployed in the district and more companies are expected to arrive soon from neighbouring States.
Shukla further said that the arrival of the rest of the security forces would begin from October 18 and the district would have its full strength of security personnel by October 24. The jawans would receive three-day special training before they would be deployed on duties. Beginning October 28, the security force personnel would be carrying out searches besides duties assigned to them, he said.
The security force personnel have also been entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring safety of the polling teams for reaching them to the polling centres and bringing them back after voting gets over, Shukla informed. The Chhattisgarh Police have prepared an action plan for deployment of the forces with the ‘Vulnerability Mapping’ done as per the directives of Election Commission. The police have also identified elements who try to intimidate and influence voters in the district which has total six assembly seats that include Rajnandgaon seat from where Chief Minister Raman Singh will contest.