EC to hold virtual meet with stakeholders in Manipur today

New Delhi, Jan 05: The Election Commission would hold a virtual meeting with top officials and representatives of political parties from Manipur on Wednesday, sources said. Manipur is one of the five states where assembly elections are due and the virtual meet is part of the stock-taking exercise of the poll panel.

The commission has already visited Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Goa and Uttarakhand in the last few days to take stock of the poll preparedness there. Top state administration officials, representatives of political parties and those part of the poll machinery would take part in the separate meetings to be held on Wednesday evening, the sources said.

While the tenure of the Uttar Pradesh legislative assembly ends in May, the terms of the legislative assemblies of Goa, Manipur and Punjab end on different dates in March. The EC is likely to announce the poll dates for the five states in the first half of this month. On Tuesday, the commission also took stock of the evolving Covid situation in the five states amid concerns over rising Omicron cases, the sources said.

The poll panel has already asked the five states to step up the inoculation drive against the viral disease and ensure that the personnel to be deployed on election duty are "double vaccinated".

In a recent letter to the chief secretaries of Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Goa, Manipur and Punjab, the EC has also reminded the five states that polling personnel come under the category of frontline workers and are eligible for the "precaution dose" of the Covid vaccines. The commission has said the polling personnel to be deployed in these states should be fully vaccinated and those eligible for the second dose of the vaccines should be administered the jabs on a priority basis, the sources said citing the letter.