Polling stations with 90% polling, of which 75% votes went to a single candidate during previous elections, will be declared as critical polling stations in the city.
A meeting convened by the District Election Officer and GHMC Commissioner M. Dana Kishore with the police department officials and the Returning Officers arrived at this decision on Wednesday.
The meeting has discussed identification of critical and hyper critical polling stations and implementation of model code of conduct.
Mr. Dana Kishore directed officials to identify the polling centres with the highest turnout of voters and also the localities where violent incidents or law and order issues arose during last elections, so that a security action plan may be prepared.
In view of model code of conduct kicking in, political parties should take prior permission from the Returning Officer concerned for meetings and ‘Padayatras’.
Meetings should be conducted with representatives of political parties at constituency level over the do’s and don’ts of conducting meetings and issuing advertisements in view of the code. The meetings should be videographed and expenditure thereof should be included in the election expenditure of the candidate concerned, he said.
Citizen services and maintenance works will continue as before, with the ban existing only on new developmental works.
Mr. Dana Kishore issued instructions to the Assistant and Deputy Commissioners of Police to personally visit the areas of critical and hyper critical polling stations.
City Police Commissioner Anjani Kumar said the mapping of vulnerable areas in the city will be completed by October 12. He also said nodal police officials for the area concerned will have to issue no objection certificates for political rallies, campaign and meetings, even after the prior permission is granted by the RO.
Possible attendance at the meeting, duration of the meeting, and rally routes should be mentioned in the request for conducting rallies and meetings.
A district level meeting with all political party representatives will be organised on October 13, Mr. Dana Kishore said.