EC to hold meeting with CEOs of Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura

Shillong, Nov 12: The Election Commission of India will hold a pre-poll preparedness review meeting with Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) of Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura at New Delhi tomorrow, officials said.

"At the meeting tomorrow, the EC will review the preparedness of these poll-bound states on the use of the VVPAT (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail) machines and also discuss the launch of BLO-net in these states," Meghalaya Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) F R Kharkongor told PTI.

All 3082 polling booths in the 60 constituencies in the state will implement the VVPAT or VPR (Verifiable Paper Record), a method of providing feedback to voters to verify that the vote polled by a voter goes to the correct candidate/party, he said.

The Election Commission will also be briefed on the achievement of the targeted enrolment drives in the state aiming to reach to 18 lakh voters of the 3.2 million populations. Among the other issues that will be discussed, will be the launching of BLO-net, a pilot project of the EC aimed at enabling booth level officers to map minute information about polling stations, nearest hospitals, roads and other landmarks, Kharkongor said.

The Meghalaya CEO said the purpose is to have a better idea of polling booths and the BLO-net will be rolled out in five constituencies in Meghalaya - East Shillong, South Shillong, North Shillong and North Tura and South Tura.

Earlier, the EC had also reviewed the security pre-poll preparedness of these states. Following the meeting tomorrow, the EC officials will visit these poll-bound states, Kharkongor said. Assembly elections in Meghalaya are due in March next year. PTI JOP RG