Polls over, EC boss off on vacation

The CEC very clearly deserves a breather after smoothly conducting one of the most closely followed and bitter assembly elections in recent political history. Sutirtho Patranobis reports.

Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalaswami walked out of the All India Radio office after a chat show on Sunday morning, a relaxed man. "I am very relaxed now. Tomorrow, I am going to Chennai on leave for 10 days," Gopalaswami said.

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The CEC very clearly deserves a breather after smoothly conducting one of the most closely followed and bitter assembly elections in recent political history.

The preparation for the elections had started in mid 2006 with the EC revising the electoral rolls. The Geographic Information System (GIS) was also used to map some constituencies. Draft rolls were circulated among political parties so that voters and areas left out could be included. By 2006, September, the roll was finalised and the sequence was repeated in February 2007.

"In response to the circular, in Ahmedabad district alone, 103,844 claims for inclusion of names were received and 73,538 claims were accepted. Similarly, 30561 names were deleted after verification" a senior EC officer said.

In July , the roll was published again and widely publicized.Polling was smooth, but certain misconceptions had surfaced. Voters assumed once an 'elector's photo identity card' was issued from a constituency he would remain a legal voter forever from that particular area. But it is important to note whether his name is included in the rolls.