Punjab steps up voters’ list revision process

CHANDIGARH: With assembly elections round the corner, Punjab has intensified the process of revision of electoral rolls.

Punjab chief electoral officer, S Karuna Raju said the pandemic is posing some challenges, however, the election machinery is geared up to tide over this unprecedented situation.

He said as per guidelines of the Election Commission of India (ECI), a special campaign for registration, deletion and correction of particulars in the voters’ list with qualifying date as January 1, 2022, has begun.

Known as special summary revision, this gives an opportunity to citizens to register themselves as voters and also verify their electoral details through offline or online medium, he added.

The state’s chief electoral officer further said that ahead of the assembly election in the first quarter of the next year, this exercise will be extensively carried out across the state. A doorto-door exercise will be undertaken by the booth-level officers (BLOs) between August 9, 2021, to October 10, 2021, to further intensify the campaign and plug the existing gaps.

He further said that to improve the health of electoral rolls and ensure enrolment of all eligible citizens, a special summary revision is conducted in the later part of each year in all states/UTs.

People who have not been able to register themselves as voters and those who find errors in the electoral rolls or have migrated to some other constituency, can utilise the special summary revision of the roll if they have attained the age of 18 on or before January 1, 2022.

He also said as per the revised guidelines, ECI has provided the facility of voting through postal ballots (PB) paper to persons above the age of 80, persons with disability and Covid-19 suspected or affected persons.