With only a day to go for votes to be counted for the 2021 Assembly election, preparations are under way at the counting centres in Government College of Technology, Coimbatore, to ensure a COVID-19-safe environment.
A Coimbatore Corporation health team had sanitised not just the 10 counting rooms, but the entire College, said sources familiar with the developments.
The civic body had deployed not fewer than 20 workers to sanitise the College. On Thursday and Friday, the team sprayed disinfectants and carried out cleaning work.
Inside the 10 counting centres, the Returning Officers concerned would ensure that at 50% counting agents wore PPE kit, the sources said.
Agents of all candidates would wear the PPE kit, but at alternate tables so that at least 50% agents at a table were clothed in the kit and those not wearing the kit would be seated between two agents wearing the kit. This included agents of Independent candidates, the sources added.
Test report
The arrangement was a part of the Election Commission of India guideline mandating the agents to produce a COVID-19 negative report issued within 72 hours of the start of the counting process.
On Friday, the Returning Officers supervised the allocation of machines to the tables and installation of boxes to count postal ballot.
Given the COVID-19 guideline and the increase in polling booths to 4,427 in the 10 Assembly constituencies and the corresponding increase in voting machines, the counting process could be slow compared to previous countings, the sources said.
Mettupalayam Assembly constituency (AC) would have 30 rounds of counting, Sulur AC 34, Kavundampalayam 34, Coimbatore North 36, Thondamuthur, 34, Coimbatore South 26, Singanallur 33, Kinathukadavu 35, Pollachi 23 and Valparai 21.
With 20 – 25 minutes to complete a round of counting, the official declaration of results would take seven hours for Valparai AC and 12 hours of Kavundampalayam, the sources added.
The increase in counting time for Kavundampalayam was notwithstanding the increase in number of tables. While nine of the 10 constituencies would have 14 counting tables, Kavunampalayam AC would have 20, given the number of polling stations, the sources pointed out.
