Central police forces will play a greater role in poll bound states: CEC Arora

In poll bound states, includingTamil Nadu, the Central police forces would play a greaterrole as part of measures to ensure fair polls and to see thatno one took any undue advantage, Chief Election CommissionerSunil Arora said here on Thursday.

Several measures were being contemplated to ensureinducement free, fair elections to the Tamil Nadu Assembly inview of allegations of inducement of voters in the past andtwo Special Expenditure Observers would also be deputed, hesaid.

The bypoll to the Kanyakumari Lok Sabha seat would beheld alongside Assembly polls, he said. The seat fell vacantfollowing the death of Congress MP, H Vasanthakumar due toCOVID-19 last year.

The top Election Commission official, wrapping upmeetings with senior officials and representatives ofpolitical parties here along with his colleagues, expressedconfidence of a free, fair and transparent elections.

In keeping with the best administrative traditions ofTamil Nadu, there shall be no 'Vellores and RK Nagars,' hesaid in an apparent reference to allegations of distributionof cash to voters and the EC's measures to prevent suchattempts.

It has been decided that for all the five poll boundstates including Tamil Nadu, the Central Armed Police Forcescoordinator shall be at the apex level of a committee thatallocated personnel from one place to the other, Arora saidaddressing a press conference.

Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal, Assam and the UnionTerritory of neighbouring Puducherry are likely to go to pollsin April or May.

The official said that at the district level, the seniormost general observer would be part of the exercise onallocation of personnel.

''This is a major decision we have already taken. It willbe formally conveyed to the Chief Electoral Officers in thenext two to three days maximum.'' The decision follows feedback from political parties anda 'complaint' that the personnel were deployed by the stategovernments ''wherever they like,'' he noted.

The Commission is trying to put more forces in everystate and the coordinator of the Central forces have beenassigned a greater role to play in terms of both deploymentand allocation of personnel so that no one took any undueadvantage when it came to exercise of franchise throughpostal ballots, he said.

Referring to a high level meeting today with Central andstate regulatory agencies, answering a question, he said theEC has emphasised a lot about measures to ensure inducementfree polls.

''There are several things we are planning to do and weshall do, but I am sorry to say that it will not be possiblefor me to share a lot of things in public domain...

because we have given instructions and we shall beconducting another meeting with senior officers andenforcement agencies after a week or 10 days virtually toreview as to what is the outcome of the meeting we heldtoday.'' The EC is sensitive to alleged inducements, he assertedand recalled cancellation of polls to Vellore ParliamentaryConstituency (2019) and bypolls to RK Nagar Assembly segment(2017), the 'harshest' action taken by the commission in anystate in respect of such allegations.

On special observers, he said, ''because of money factorof inducement in Tamil Nadu, besides the normal observers wesend, we have decided to send Special Expenditure Observers(SEO).'' This would be in addition to district observers, henoted.

Such SEOs shall be noted for their integrity and wouldbe of the rank of retired secretaries of the Centre and alsoformer chaipersons of the Central Board of Direct Taxes.

There shall be at least two SEOs and one of them shall bea very senior person for guidance for Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

The exercise of deputing SEOs was being done on a stateto state basis and not followed necessarily eveywhere while insome states, the special focus would be on law and orderfront.

The top official expressed displeasure over the work bysome regulatory arms of the Tamil Nadu government ahead of thenotification of state polls.

''When we had the meeting of the regulatory agencies, Imust say we were quite unhappy with the overall performance ofthe state excise department as well as the Special DGenforcement. We have brought the relevant facts to the noticeof the Chief Secretary.'' Since the state has excise revenue of Rs 34,000 crore,he said, ''we felt that much more could have been done'' vis-a-vis matters like the kind of seizures done.

''... how many decimal points you have to put after thezero, the honourable excise commissioner was not even able tocalculate it.'' He said the EC was very disappointed about notapprehending the 'big fish.' On this matter, he said they were apprised that duringenforcement in a particular seizure of almost Rs two crore,the authorities registered 23,000 to 27,000 cases.

It meant that these were against the ''small guys, somedrivers, some couriers, the foot soldiers who were beingcaught and not the big fish.'' The EC has sought a special report on this matter fromthe Additional Chief Secretary Home who also looked after theFinance Department, he noted.

From the previous 68,324 polling stations in Tamil Nadu,there would be 25,000 more now as per the norms to preventspread of COVID-19 and in total there shall be 93,000 booths,he said adding it also meant mobilisation of more men andmaterials.

As regards arrangements for procurement of COVID-19related materials, the state Chief Secretary has assured thatthese would be available on time.

Asked on likelihood of TN elections being held in Aprilor May and if polls would be conducted in a single phase, hesaid these would be made known later at the time ofannouncement of elections.