Jharkhand panchayat polls ,3-tier panchayat polls in Jharkhand from Nov 22, Jharkhand gram panchayat polls, Jharkhand nagar panchayat polls 2015, Jharkhand panchayat polls date announced, Jharkhand panchayat ULB elections, Jharkhand civic polls
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- Category: Jharkhand Political News
- Last Updated: Friday, 09 October 2015 15:24
Jharkhand panchayat polls ,3-tier panchayat polls in Jharkhand from Nov 22, Jharkhand gram panchayat polls, Jharkhand nagar panchayat polls 2015, Jharkhand panchayat polls date announced, Jharkhand panchayat ULB elections, Jharkhand civic polls
Ranchi: The state election commission (SEC) on Thursday blew the poll bugle for a three-tier panchayat election in Jharkhand, making it a four-phase affair between November 22 and December 12. State chief election commissioner Shiv Basant announced the dates of the polls, which will be contested in 263 blocks across 24 districts and brought the model code of conduct into immediate effect in Jharkhand, excluding the municipal bodies and army cantonments. The second and third phase of the polls will be held on November 28 and December 5, respectively.
The three-tier panchayat system will witness contest for 4,402 gram pradhan/mukhiya and 54,330 members of gram panchayat besides 545 zila parishad members and 5,423 panchayat samity members. A little over 1.72 crore voters, of which over 82 lakh are women, are expected to exercise their franchise in 54,298 polling stations across the districts in a month's time from Thursday. The counting for the first and second phases will be held on December 6, while that of the third and last be held at December 13 and 19 respectively.
The SEC ignored Jharkhand Mukti Morcha's (JMM) demand of ensuring two-tier elections in Schedule 5 areas of the state under the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act of 1996. "The Jharkhand Panchayati Raj Act of 2001 is in compliance with the PESA Act," was Basant's brief reply. Last week, a JMM MLA delegation had submitted a memorandum to governor Droupadi Murmu in this regard. The only panchayat polls in the state, held in 2010, had also left out the PESA recommendations which mandates two-tier panchayati system in scheduled tribe areas.
With 22 of its 24 districts affected by extreme left-wing activities, the police will pump all its resources into the feast of democracy to ensure free, fair and violence free polling, DGP DK Pandey said. As many as 24 battalions of paramilitary forces including the CRPF, SSB and CoBRA will be used alongside armed units of the state's police machinery (132 companies of Jharkhand Armed Police with Jharkhand Jaguar, District Armed Police) and police home guards. "The area domination exercises, crackdown on probable trouble-mongers will begin shortly. Detailed route plans for polling parties, which includes air-dropping and lifting in remote areas, will be ready," he added.
Following directives from the Election Commission of India (ECI), the state is laying special emphasis on its 450 kilometre border with Bihar, which runs through 10 districts. "We are coordinating with Bihar Police since election was notified there. As many as 11 coordination meetings have been held with Bihar Police so far to seal borders. Extra forces have been requisitioned for from the Centre," ADG operations SN Pradhan said.
src: toi