May 16 counting to be held in 4 stations under video surveillance

Counting to begin in 39 halls at 8 A.M

Adequate security arrangements made: IGP Kashmir  

Srinagar: The state electoral office have almost completed preparations including plans for training sessions for the May 16 Lok Sabha election counting which will be carried out at four counting stations including Kargil.

According to IGP Kashmir A.G Mir, adequate security arrangements have been made for the four stations which include Baramulla, Anantnag, Srinagar and Kargil. “We have made adequate security arrangements to facilitate smooth counting in all these counting stations,” he told KNS.  According to an officer in state electoral office a fair and an incident-free counting is the objective of Election Commission of India (ECI) and all the election officers have been directed to work towards it. “The counting in three Lok Sabah seats of Kashmir valley will be carried out in 39 halls and each counting station will have video surveillance to watch over,” the officer in state electoral office informed.

The security measures for counting halls and strong-rooms (which hold the Electronic Voting Machines), training sessions for Returning Officers, Assistant Returning Officer and District Electoral Officers for all the four stations have been planned as per the ECI guidelines.  Election officers at the training session would be acquainted with the counting procedures, postal ballot counting and EVM operation, an official in state electoral office told KNS.

The deputy commissioner Srinagar Farooq Ahmad Shah who is also the returning officer for Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency informed KNS that the counting of votes for central Kashmir parliamentary constituency will take place at 8 AM in SKICC. “We have created 8 halls with 64 tables for 15 assembly segments of the constituency. We have divided counting for these 15 segments into two sessions. In first session of the counting we will count votes of 8 segments and in second session the counting will be for the other 7 segments,” he told KNS.

Similarly, in South Kashmir the counting will be carried at Government Degree College Boys Khanabal Anantnag at 8 AM. “We have created 16 halls for 16 assembly segments of the South Kashmir constituency,” Saugat Biswas, deputy commissioner and returning officer for Anantnag Lok Sabha constituency told KNS. He said adequate arrangements have been made for the counting procedure.

In Baramulla the counting be held at Government Boys Degree College at 8 AM. “We have created 15 counting halls for 15 assembly segments of the Baramulla Lok Sabha constituency and adequate arrangements have been made for the counting,” Farooq Ahmad Lone, deputy commissioner Baramulla who is also the returning officer for the North Kashmir parliamentary constituency told KNS.