The office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), Jharkhand has started preparing for the Mandar Assembly by-election. EVMs will be procured from three districts of the State. Apart from Ranchi, Chief Electoral Officer, K Ravi Kumar has given instructions to the DCs of all three districts in this regard. Regarding EVM shifting, the Chief Electoral Officer has said to get 1500 Ballot Units (BUs) from Deoghar, 671 from Palamu and 238 Control Units (CUs) from Latehar i.e. a total of 909 CUs.
The DCs of all the four districts have been asked to ensure 100 per cent adherence to the protocol laid down by the Election Commission of India during EVM shifting.
Ranchi district will bear the expenses for this work. The Chief Electoral Officer has said that the warehouse and strong room attached in the election/court litigation should not be opened for this work.
There are 429 booths in 271 buildings of Mandar assembly constituency. That is, apart from 429 BU and 429 CU, 10 percent reserve is also to be kept. On the other hand, First Label Checking (FLC) will be done after getting BU-CU of EVM machines from all the three districts. With this it will be known that how many BU (Ballet Unit) or CU (Control Unit) of the EVMs are defective. The schedule regarding FLC is likely to be released from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer by May 20.
According to the information, FLC of EVMs will be held like other elections in Birsa Munda Football Stadium premises located at Morhabadi ground in Ranchi.
There are also reasons behind the demand for more BU-CU of EVMs for the Mandar by-election. Actually there are total 16 buttons in EVM machine. In which up to 15 number of candidates and 16th number button belongs to NOTA. In such a situation, if more than 15 candidates enter the fray, then two EVMs will have to be installed at each booth. Meaning if 16 candidates also enter the fray, 858 EVMs will have to be installed in 429 booths of Mandar.
On March 28, a special CBI court sentenced Mandar MLA, Bandhu Tirkey to three years' imprisonment for having disproportionate assets. After this verdict the Jharkhand Legislative Assembly terminated the membership of Tirkey by issuing a notification on 8 April. After the end of the membership of Tirkey, the Mander Assembly seat became vacant.