“The district administration has completed all the preparations for the big day i.e. vote counting on June 4, 2024. For the same, 08 rooms have been reserved in the College of Agricultural Engineering (opposite strong room) and Agricultural Engineering Administrative building (below strong room) at Jawaharlal Nehru Agriculture University (JNAU) campus, where counting of votes cast at 2139 polling centres will take place to decide fate of 19 candidates,” informed District Election Officer and Collector Deepak Saxena. He was addressing a press conference to share information about preparations for counting of votes, on Thursday. The Collector informed that strong room will be opened at 6 am on June 4 whereas counting will start at 8 am. From NH-7, counting venue can be entered through the gate of Indian Coffee House whereas, 03 entrances have been made to enter the counting rooms. The counting agents of Jabalpur Cantt (99), Jabalpur West (100), Panagar (101) and Sihora (102) will be able to enter the first entrance by using their admit cards.

 

The second entrance will be for entry of Government officers and employees while third entrance will be reserved for counting agents of Patan (95), Bargi (96) and Jabalpur North (98) and journalists. Suvidha Kendra will be established at the first and third entrance to deposit mobile phones which will not allowed inside the counting rooms. Counting of Patan, Bargi, Jabalpur West and Panagar constituencies will be completed in 16 rounds each, Jabalpur East in 15, Jabalpur Cantt in 14 while Jabalpur North and Sihora will be completed in 18 rounds each. ETPBS (Electronic Transmitted Postal Ballot) scanning and postal ballot papers will be counted at room no. 09 of Administrative Building. The total number of postal ballot papers were 2543 out of which 775 were service voters, 557 votes were casted at Suvidha Kendras while remaining 1211 were absentee voters. As per counting personnel management, 01 Assistant Returning Officer (ARO) and 03 Additional ARO will be available for each constituency whereas, every EVM Counting Table has 01 supervisor, 01 counting assistant and 01 micro-observer. Similarly, every table reserved for counting of postal ballot paper will have 01 counting supervisor, 02 counting assistants and 01 micro-observer. Along with reserve, a total 700 employees will be required.

 

The first randomisation was conducted on May 22, 2024. The second randomisation will be carried out 24 hours before counting on June 3, while third randomisation will be done at 5 am on June 4. Second and third randomisation will be conducted in presence of observers. Three observers including Pranjal Yadav IAS, AD Joshi SCS and M K Joshi SCS will minutely observe the entire process. IAS Yadav will be observer for Patan, Bargi and Jabalpur East, Joshi will be for Jabalpur North and Jabalpur Cantt while MK Joshi will be the observer for Jabalpur West, Panagar and Sihora. The entry pass colour codes have been allotted for different constituencies including orange for Patan, yellow for Bargi, Blue for Jabalpur East, red for Jabalpur North, green for Jabalpur Cantt, white for Jabalpur West, grey for Panagar while purple for Sihora, respectively.