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Kerala, which goes to the polls in the second phase on Friday, has 742 polling stations in the ‘vulnerable’ category and 1,161 in the ‘critical’ category.
Sixty-two companies of Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) personnel have been deployed in the State as part of the security measures to ensure a free and fair Lok Sabha polls, Chief Electoral Officer (Kerala) Sanjay Kaul told The Hindu.
Election officials are expecting an incident-free elections on Friday. “The Election Commission’s assessment is that Kerala is not sensitive as some other parts of the country where you expect law and order problems,” Mr. Kaul said. The CAPF units will complement the State police in providing security at the polling stations, vulnerable locations, and strong rooms holding the electronic voting machines (EVM).
25,231 polling stations
Kerala has 25,231 polling stations in all, including 54 auxiliary stations. Of this, webcasting is being arranged in 22,956 polling stations. As part of the security arrangements, webcasting is planned in all polling booths in eight districts — Kasaragod, Kannur, Wayanad, Malappuram, Kozhikode, Palakkad, Thrissur, and Thiruvananthapuram. In the remaining districts, webcasting will be arranged in 75% of the booths.
For the Lok Sabha polls in Kerala, the Election Commission has posted, in all, 50 poll observers. This includes 20 general observers, 20 expenditure observers, and 10 police observers.
