Postal ballots can decide candidates' fate as election results unpredictable

Mahesh Sharma

Mandi Ahmedgarh/Raikot/

Samrala, February 24

Efficacy of the postal service is visualised as equally important for declaration of results of the Assembly segments of this region falling under Ludhiana and Malerkotla districts as result of none of the contests is apparent.

Fate of candidates in any of the segments might be altered with the arrival of the postal employee, who will deliver postal ballots on March 10 when the counting begins, as majority of the results are unpredictable.

Meanwhile, employees on election duty, receiving postal ballots, are losing no time to cast their vote and posting it in an envelope at the nearest post office of their localities.

Investigations revealed that Returning Officers of various constituencies had already got ballot papers of officials concerned sent via post to addresses mentioned in their applications, submitted before commencement of their special duties.

Now, when almost all employees, except those deployed on counting duty, have returned to their parent departments, they are casting their vote in presence of an authorised government official and getting it posted to the returning officer concerned.

The voter is not required to pay any postage for sending the envelope containing postal ballot to the returning officer.

The Principal, MGMN Senior Secondary School, Viney Goyal, said most employees of his school, who applied for the postal ballot, had received it and cast their vote.

“While we have received some envelopes for the election duty staff at the school address other employees have been advised to check the arrival of their ballot papers from the post office concerned,” said Goyal, who claimed that efforts were on to make sure that all postal votes reached the returning officer concerned before counting of votes begins.

The Samrala SDM, Vikramjit Singh Panthey, said officials concerned had been advised to ensure that ballots received through post offices were kept in safe custody and dealt according to guidelines of the Election Commission on the fateful day.

“Having received instructions about zero tolerance from the District Election Officer-cum-Deputy Commissioner Varinder Sharma we have advised officials concerned to ensure that no one is deprived of his or her right to vote during this election,” said Panthey while maintaining that all postal ballots delivered by authorised postal employees on the counting day would also be considered.