Calcutta, June 26: Forget the endless wait to get a passport-sized photograph shot for a voter identity card. You may just walk into one of many centres assigned to deal with it and get the job done that day itself.

The shortcut to the card will initially be available to voters in Calcutta and Salt Lake. Four permanent centres will be set up in the city and one in the township from where the cards can be obtained.

“Many people still do not have their elector’s photo identity cards and hate to wait till we make arrangements for the photographs to be taken. This is why these permanent centres will be set up in the city, which people can visit at their own convenience to get their cards,” chief electoral officer Basudeb Banerjee said today.

Altogether, 65 such centres would be opened in all subdivisions. Voters can walk into the centres at their own convenience, five days a week.

Now, three weeks are fixed every year for data compilation for the cards. Before the beginning of that spell, a campaign is run to inform those still left out of the process.

“Every year, the list is updated with new voters and first-timers. But people have to wait till that particular time of the year. With the new system, this can be done away with,” an official said.

Over Rs 50 lakh has been sanctioned for the purpose.

Banerjee’s office is now looking for space for the centres. “There will be one in north Calcutta, one in the central part of the city and another in the south. One of the possible centres would be on the poll panel’s office on Strand Road and another in the South 24-Parganas district magistrate’s office in Alipore?,” said an official.

In Bengal, over 85 per cent of voters have their photo I-cards, but it should ideally be 100 per cent. Pondicherry and Kerala are close to that figure.

In Calcutta, though, the number of voters who have the cards is lower than the state average ? 80 per cent.

“It reflects the same lack of will that is seen during voting. This is in sharp contrast to, say, Uttar Dinajpur, where 96 per cent of the voters already have the cards,” a senior official said.

The Election Commission expects the percentage in Bengal to go up to 95 per cent before the 2006 Assembly polls.

It is also planning to introduce an SMS enquiry service that will enable a voter to know his/her polling booth and voter number and also electoral rolls with voters’ photographs.