Akshay Azad Jammu, Oct 28: While Election Commission has strictly prohibited use of polythene and plastic for advertisement by political parties, some district level officers are advising political parties to use plastic material for election publicity. According to notice issued by District Election Officers of Kathua and Ramban for fixation of rates of election related material, which has been published in newspapers, in the concluding paragraph, it has been written as "Use of plastic, polythene and polythene based advertisement material is strictly prohibited in the district". But in the same notice, the section-10 read as, rate for Cutouts (Cloth/Plastic) Rs. 25/Sq feet. Moreover, in another notice, the tehsil officer Hiranagar, has also given an advertisement in which it has been maintained that polythene or plastic is banned, as High Court of state has imposed ban on polythene. "If one goes by the notice, it seems that Election Officers are not sincere while issuing notice to various newspapers", an official said, adding that it might be a printing mistake. If one goes by the election publicity material published by various political parties, plastic and polythene is used rampantly by all the political parties for making posters, banners, party flags etc. When contacted District Election Officer Kathua, he maintained that it was just a printing error in the section 10 of notice and it has already been clarified. |