Akshay Azad
Early Times Report
JAMMU, Apr 1: The gazetted officers deputed for election duty in district Kahua will have to trek mountains while carrying Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs whereas their counterpart non-gazetted officers will be supervising them in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
The Election Officer Kathua on Monday issued an order, deputing several gazetted as well as non-gazetted government employees for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and the training of the election staff is slated to start on Tuesday at Women College Kathua.
As per the election order, several gazetted officers including Assistant Professors, Associate Professors along with Lab Assistant, Technician beside others have been deputed as P1, P2 and P3 while Patwaris, Teachers, Wardens have been deputed as P0.
The Election Office deputed four government employees at one polling station for conducting elections. These employees act as Presiding Officer (PO) and usually gazetted officers or senior-most are deputed as POs while Polling Officer 1,2,3 (P1, P2, P3) are deputed as per their seniority, to do some manual works such as carry EVMs and transporting them to Polling Stations, marking ink on fingers of voters, checking documents etc.
"We were shocked to find that even one Associate Professor has been deputed as Polling Officer (P1) by the Election officer Kathua and many other Assistant Professor have been deputed as P1, P2, P3. On the other hand, wardens, PET have been deputed as Polling Officers (POs), which is humiliating for the gazetted officers", an official said, adding that once the duties were assigned, the gazetted officer would have to accept the dictates of his/her senior during election duty while they would be juniors.
The officers further alleged that it was deliberately done by an attached Rehbar-e-Talim teacher at Election Office Kathua for the last many years, while his actual place of posting was somewhere 20 kilometers from district headquarters. "During Panchayat polls, we were deputed as Returning Officers as well as Magistrate but this time they have deputed us under subordinate officers, which is unjust", the officials said.
Deputy Election Officer Kathua Ashwani Kumar said that these were tentative duties and were assigned randomly. "These are not the final lists and if there would be any issue with seniority of officers, same will be rectified", Ashwani said, and denied the allegations about the involvement of RET employee in marking the duties. |
