The Election Commission of India (ECI) announced a new system Tuesday to minimize the time lag associated with the earlier manual method, according to a press release issued by the poll body.
The new system will reduce delays and increase transparency in the sharing of approximate voter turnout data during elections.
People familiar with the development said the commission will implement the process during the upcoming Bihar elections through the ECINET application–a one-stop digital interface that aims to integrate more than 40 of ECI’s existing mobile and web applications.
The commission stated that the change was aimed at ensuring timely public communication via the Voter Turnout (VTR) App, though it emphasised that the data-sharing process is not backed by statute and functions purely as a facilitative measure.
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“Under this new initiative, the presiding officer of each polling station will now be directly entering voter turnout on the new ECINET App every two hours on polling day to reduce the time lag in the updation of the approximate polling trends. This will be automatically aggregated at the constituency level. The approximate voting percentage trends will continue to be published every two hours before [reducing the time taken to update the exact voting percentage at a later stage],” the commission said in its release.
The VTR App, built by the commission in 2019, is used to share aggregated approximate voter turnout data. Previously, sector magistrates or officers–each covering 10-12 polling stations–collected the voter turnout data manually and relayed it to Returning Officers, who are in charge of one or two constituencies and responsible for declaring elected candidates. This was done via phone calls, SMS, or messaging apps and the data was then aggregated every two hours and uploaded to the App. However, polling percentage trends were often updated hours later due to physical records arriving late at night or even the next day.
Under the statutory framework of the Conduct of Elections Rules, the Presiding Officers are required to furnish Form 17C–which details the account of votes recorded–to booth-level agents nominated by political parties, who are present at the polling station at the close of polls.
“Notably, voter turnout data will now be entered into ECINET by Presiding Officers immediately after the close of poll, before they leave the polling station, which will reduce the delays and ensure that the updated approximate percentage of votes polled would be available…[however, the process is] subject to network connectivity. Where mobile networks are unavailable, entries can be made offline and synced once connectivity is restored”, the poll watchdog said.
The commission explained that after the polls, the safe depositing of EVMs and election papers in strongrooms is prioritised. Once complete, the returning officers will then collect voter turnout data from Presiding Officers of each polling booth and begin entering the close of poll data into the VTR App.
“[In this process] the updated voter turnout starts continuously reflecting on the VTR App again from 7 pm onwards. [Also] polling teams come from varying distances and face different logistical challenges, such as late-hour voting trends, difficult geographical and weather conditions, communication issues, and tough terrain. As a result, voter turnout data is received at different times in the evening of polling day, sometimes overnight, and occasionally even the next day,” the commission had said.
