Kolkata, April 1 (IANS) Chief Election Commissioner V.S. Sampath will visit West Bengal April 5 to oversee the preparations for the Lok Sabha polls in the state, an official said Tuesday.
Sampath’s visit comes within two weeks of Deputy Election Commissioner Vinod Zutshi’s assessment of the preparations.
According to Amit Roy Chaudhury, officer on special duty and ex-officio joint secretary, Sampath will hold an all-party meeting and discuss poll-related issues with district election officers, returning officers and police commissioners April 6.
He will also meet state Chief Secretary Sanjay Mitra.
Meanwhile, the poll panel has identified over 11, 284 “vulnerable hamlets” in the 42 parliamentary constituencies of the state and has earmarked 8,578 troublemakers. Preventive action has been taken against 7,251.
The official said all booths in Jadavpur constituency will get the voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) systems.
There are 15,78,977 registered voters in the area and the number of booths stand at 1,959.
The official said the commissioning of electronic voting machines (EVMs) will begin April 5 for the first phase of polls.
As many as 35,36,000 poll personnel will be deployed in the first phase of the election in the state April 17.
Expenditure, awareness and general observers have arrived for the first phase.
He said as much as 32.7 kg of explosives, 975 cartridges, and 3,372 bombs have been seized in the state so far.
“The number of arms licence deposited stand at 14,662 while 2,287 have been impounded and 145 cancelled,” he said.
As many as 31,244 non-bailable warrants have been executed, 34,000 are pending, while 34,451 are under the bind-down provision of Code of Criminal Procedure, he said.