Bhubaneswar, Aug. 12: The Orissa Election Commission today set in motion the process for conduct of panchayat elections by announcing the schedule for preparing the revised electoral roll.
The next panchayat poll is due in March 2012; the last election was held in 2007.
Talking to the media, state election commissioner Ajit Kumar Tripathy said the rural polls would be held before March 2012 to 87,551 wards, 6,236 gram panchayats, 314 panchayat samitis and 30 zilla parishads.
An estimated Rs 52.23 crore will be spent on the polls, while another Rs 4 crore has been earmarked for law and order arrangements, he added.
A total of 87,551 ward members, 6,236 sarpanchs, an equal number of panchayat samiti members and 854 zilla parishad members will be elected directly by 2.4 crore voters across the state.
Elections will be held next year to all these posts except that of Dhinkia sarpanch in Jagatsinghpur district and 23 ward members under the same gram panchayat, the election commissioner said.
Explaining the reason for skipping elections in the troubled Dhinkia area, which falls in the site for the proposed Posco project, he said polls had been held in these areas late in May 2009 because of law and order problems. Hence the elections for the area would be due in 2014. This time, four new gram panchayats have been carved out in Jajpur district and one each in Nayagarh and Keonjhar districts.
The coming panchayat poll will be conducted on the basis of voters’ list for Assembly elections published in 2011. Names of those who will complete 18 years by November 1 this year will be included in the existing voters’ list.
The preliminary ward-wise voters’ list will be ready by September 14 and objections will be received till September 21. Objections will be heard by the electoral registration officers and the respective block development officers. The final revised voters’ list will be published on November 2 and printed copies of the revised electoral roll will be submitted to the state election commission by December 3.
