The election commission has prepared at least 30,000 electronic voting machines for the elections to Dhaka north and south city corporations.
The commission is fully prepared to use EVMs in all polling stations in the elections to the bifurcated Dhaka, slated for Jan 30, said Brig Gen Mohammad Saidul Islam, director general of the NID Registration Wing at the EC, reports bdnews24.com.
“There are more than 2,000 polling centres in two cities. They have around 14,600 booths. We are planning to have 30,000 EVMs with reserves to tackle any emergency situation. The commission also planned to have one EVM per centre as a backup.”
EVMs will be supplied from 19 points of Dhaka’s north and south city corporations for training, demonstration, mock voting and distribution at various voting centres. Of them, the EVMs will be available in the north at eight points, and in the south at 11 points.
Voting in the two cities will be held from 8am to 4pm on Jan 30. People will exercise their voting rights to elect city mayors and councillors with EVMs for the first time in Dhaka. The EVMs will be distributed by January 14, according to EC sources.
The BNP had always opposed the use of EVMs and it expressed reservations again this time over fears of result manipulation.
CEC KM Nurul Huda, however, said the commission opted for EVMs as the machines “proved fruitful” in previous polls.
The EC also decided to deploy two army personnel to each centre to operate the EVM. However, they will provide only ‘technical support’.
