The Hindu : Notification for Goa elections on May 6

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Thursday, Apr 18, 2002

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Notification for Goa elections on May 6

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI April 17. Elections to the 40-member Goa Assembly would be held on May 30, followed by by-elections for three vacancies in Lok Sabha and 12 in various State Legislative Assemblies on May 31. This was announced by the Election Commission here today.

For the Lok Sabha, the by-elections are being held for Amalapuram in Andhra Pradesh, Akbarpur in Uttar Pradesh and Dumka in Jharkhand. The Amalapuram seat fell vacant following the death of the Lok Sabha Speaker, G.M.C. Balayogi, in an air crash last month, while Akbarpur has become vacant after the BSP leader, Mayawati, resigned her seat after being elected to the U.P. Assembly. The Dumka seat fell vacant after Babu Lal Marandi resigned to take over as Jharkand Chief Minister.

As regards by-elections to the State Assemblies, the seats that are going in for the polls include Saidapet, Vaniyambadi and Acharapakkam in Tamil Nadu. Saidapet and Vaniyambadi were to have gone to the polls in February itself along with Andipatti, from where the AIADMK supremo, Jayalalithaa, contested successfully. The elections had been postponed following complaints of discrepancies in the rolls.

The other Assembly seats where by-elections are being held are: Deverkonda in Andhra Pradesh, Narasimharaja in Karnataka, Danapur in Bihar, Jalgaon in Maharashtra, Bhadrak in Orissa, Onda in West Bengal and Baheri, Jahangirganj and Dabai in Uttar Pradesh. The Danapur seat had fallen vacant after the RJD supreme, Laloo Prasad Yadav, resigned from it on getting elected to the Rajya Sabha.

The formal notification for the Goa Assembly would be issued on May 6, the last date for filing of nominations would be May 13, scrutiny on May 14 and last date for withdrawal May 16. The counting would be held on June 1.

With regards to the by-elections to fill Lok Sabha and Assembly vacancies also, the schedule for the run-up to the polls would be the same for all the seats, except for the one in Karnataka. For it, while the formal notification would be issued on May 6 and the last date for filing of nominations May 13 like in the case of others, the scrutiny would be on May 15 and the last date for withdrawal on May 17. Counting of votes for all the by-elections would be held on June 2.

Announcing the decisions, the spokesperson of the Commission, A.N. Jha, said the model code would come into effect immediately. While in Goa, it would be applicable to the entire State, in other States it would be applicable to the district where the Parliamentary or the Assembly seats fell.

Asked whether elections in Gujarat were discussed at the meeting, he said it was too premature to make any comment. Pressed further, he replied that "many issues were discussed''.

On the revision of electoral rolls for Gujarat which was reported to have been disrupted in the wake of the riots, he said the draft rolls had been published. Finalisation of the rolls would be completed in a few weeks, he added.

Asked about the election to the post of President, Mr. Jha pointed out that there was still time as K.R. Narayanan's tenure was coming to an end only on July 24. As per law, there had to be a gap between the issue of notification and the holding of the elections. So, it would be decided later on.

He said electronic voting machines would be used both for elections to the Goa Assembly and for the by-elections. Identification of voters would also be compulsory. Where electoral identity cards had not been issued, alternate arrangements would be made for the identification for the voters.

As regards elections in Kashmir, which are due in the later part of this year, he said the draft electoral rolls had been already distributed up to the grass root levels of panchayats and local bodies and feedback was awaited. Then the rolls would be finalised. Necessary changes in the law had been made to pave the way for the use of EVMs in that State also, he added.

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Notification for Goa elections on May 6