New Delhi:
As the curtain on the Karnataka Assembly elections 2018 will raise for people in the state to cast their ballots on Saturday, the police force has been working tirelessly to make sure there are no major incidents during the poll.
“Twenty percent booths are sensitive. 82,157 police and home guards, and 585 central forces companies have been deployed. No communal violence has been reported. Rs 166 crore in cash and other election-related material have been seized,” Karnataka DGP and IG Neelamani Raju said while briefing the media about poll preparation on the eve of voting.
Over 20,000 personnel from city police and central armed force would be on duty in Bengaluru alone, as per the reports.There are 1,200 critical polling booths and 324 ranked extremely vulnerable booths which would all be under the surveillance of central armed reserve personnel.
“The entire city police force, which is about 16,000 personnel, will be on duty alongside 44 different companies of CAPF like Central Reserve Police Force, Central Industrial Security Force, Border Security Force and others,” said Bengaluru Police Commissioner TS Kumar.Security arrangements will be reviewed by 16 DCPs and ACPs, he added.
Of the 8,096 licensed arms holders in the city, around 7,500 had surrendered their weapons to local stations, Kumar further said.“The remaining are either commissioned to state or central government employees,” he said.
Meanwhile, 117 election related minor incidents have been reported till now but no communal incidents have happened yet.Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code have been in force for a 72-hour time frame beginning from Thursday 5 pm, as per the police.
Sale of liquor have been put to a temporary stop and there is also a ban on five or more people gathering in public spaces. The 72-hour period ends at 6 pm on Sunday.
Facebook to send reminders for voting
Meanwhile, Facebook and Karnataka’s Chief Electoral Officer had announced their collaboration to increase engagement and participation in the upcoming Karnataka State Legislative Assembly elections on Friday. As a part of this collaboration, Facebook will promote voting through a reminder in people’s newsfeed on 12th May. This polling day reminder will be shown at the top of the News Feed of the Facebook users who are 18 and above. The reminder links to the Chief Electoral Officer’s website (https://kgis.ksrsac.in/election) where people can find details on their polling booth and other polling day information.
The reminder, which follows a similar format of that recently used in the England's local elections will help encourage participation in the upcoming Karnataka State Legislative Assembly elections, and will be run in conjunction with Chief Electoral Officer Karnataka’s campaign to encourage people to vote. "This initiative will help us in motivating more number of voters to come out and exercise their franchise," CEO Shri Sanjiv Kumar said.
