Dates and guidelines for Odisha panchayat polls declared

Bhubaneswar: From February 16 to 24, Odisha's three-tier panchayat elections will be held in five phases.

The polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. on February 16, 18, 20, 22, and 24. The results will be announced on the 26th, 27th, and 28th of February. The counting will take place at the block level, rather than at the booth level.

At a news conference on Tuesday, State Election Commissioner (SEC) Aditya Prasad Padhi revealed the election schedule.

According to Padhi, the elections must be held in order to fulfil constitutional commitments. "We can't put it off since a new COVID variation could emerge in the future," he warned. "We want to have safe elections as much as possible." It's just as crucial as having free and fair elections," he stressed.

Padhi also released election rules for 853 zilla parishads, 6,794 panchayats, and 91,913 wards. Over 2.79 crore people will cast their ballots.

The Model Code of Conduct will be in effect from Tuesday until February 28 as a result of the dates being announced, he said.

Other important dates include the distribution of poll notification on January 13th. The final candidate list will be released on January 25. Candidates will submit their nominations between January 17 and 21, with the papers being scrutinised on January 22. The deadline for withdrawing nomination papers is January 25, according to the SEC.

Candidates must file affidavits throughout the nomination process, and filing false affidavits is a criminal offence. Because of the COVID-19 third wave, no rallies or public meetings will be permitted. According to the SEC, only door-to-door and virtual campaigning will be permitted.

The surveys will be conducted in complete accordance with COVID guidelines. Only five people will be permitted to campaign door to door, there will be no victory rallies, and only vaccinated and COVID-19 negative people will be allowed inside counting centres, according to the SEC.

For the smooth conduct of the polls, around 200 police platoons would be deployed, comparable to the 2017 rural polls.

From 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., a call centre will be open with a toll-free number of 1800-345-7787. From 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., a Control Room will be open at the poll commission's office (0674-2573494).

The polls will not be held this time since seven GPs — four from Remuna in Balasore, two from Odanga in Nayagarh, and one from Bijepur in Bargarh district — have been included in NACs.

The SEC announced that elections for Naib Sarpanch, Panchayat Samiti Chairman, and Zilla Parishad Chairman will be place on March 11 and March 12, respectively.