Get ready for Bihar assembly polls, CEO tells DMs

PATNA: Bihar chief electoral officer (CEO) H R Srinivasa on Tuesday held a videoconference with all district magistrates and deputy election officers and asked them to start preparations for the upcoming assembly elections due in October-November this year.
All leading political parties have already begun preparations for the assembly polls as BJP is to hold a ‘virtual rally’ of Union home minister Amit Shah on June 7 through social media platforms while ally JD(U) has started interacting with its grassroots workers through live chat using different cellphone Apps. Shah’s meeting was earlier scheduled on June 9, said state BJP president Dr Sanjay Jaiswal in a press statement on Tuesday.
When contacted, the CEO told TOI that the motive behind the meeting was to keep the election machinery ready and complete groundworks for the assembly polls as and when asked by the Election Commission of India (ECI).
“Six months before the constitution of assembly is considered election period. The present legislative assembly was constituted on November 12, 2015. Accordingly, Bihar has entered the election period for the next assembly polls. We have to initiate a number of activities like systematic voters’ education and electoral participation program (SVEEP), fist level checking of EVMs and VVPAT machines, their storage and transportation,” Srinivasa said.
“We are also required to initiate special summary revision of the voter list,” he added.
When asked if the assembly election could be delayed owing to Covid-19 pandemic, Srinivasa said: “We have no such information. We want ourselves to be ready.”
One of the DMs told TOI that they will have to expedite poll preparations as significant time has been lost due to Covid-19. “We are already going behind schedule. The Covid crisis is another stumbling block in such works but we will be ready for ECI order to conduct the elections,” he said.
Another DM said they will start updating voter list first, which may take up to two months. “Bidding process will have to be initiated for several works,” he said.
Meanwhile, JD(U) national secretary general K C Tyagi told TOI on Tuesday that party president and CM Nitish Kumar held a series of interaction programmes with the JD(U) grassroots and field workers using mobile Apps. Asked whether JD(U) is planning a virtual rally on the pattern of BJP, Tyagi said Shah’s proposed virtual rally is part of the NDA political campaign for the coming assembly elections.
BJP’s state vice-president and former MLA Rajib Ranjan said the party is making preparations on all 243 seats. “We will contest the seats finalized after seat-sharing among the NDA allies,” he told TOI.
Ranjan said Amit Shah would sound the poll bugle in state on June 7 by addressing the party workers of all 45 organizational districts through social media platforms. “We are making preparations to ensure that Shah’s speech is heard by around 50 lakh party workers at more than 9,300 ‘shakti kendras’ across the state,” Ranjan said.
‘Shakti kendra’ is an organizational unit of BJP at panchayat level to energize the party workers in rural areas.
In the opposition camp, RJD has already launched a ‘vitriolic’ attack against government alleging poor law and order in Bihar. However, RJD is yet to come out with a plan of campaigning like the BJP.
“For RJD, extending help to the returned migrant workers in this hour of crisis is more important than holding a virtual rally. The RJD workers are visiting villages and helping the returned migrant workers,” party spokesperson Chittranjan Gagan said on Tuesday.
RJD ally Congress on Tuesday staged ‘dharna’ at all district headquarters on the issue of migrant workers, while former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi-led Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular (HAM-S) has planned a two-hour ‘dharna’ at its all district offices on June 3, with an eye on the forthcoming assembly polls.