DIMAPUR, May 3 - The Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) today sought to know from the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) of India why the Congress candidate in the April 11 Lok Sabha election in the State was issued lesser number of polling agent forms by the Nagaland Chief Electoral Officer�s (CEO) office.
In a letter to the CEC, NPCC working president Khriedi Theunuo asked why the expenditure incurred for printing of additional polling agent forms by the candidate should be included in the account of his election expenditure.
The NPCC sought a detailed clarification from the CEC on inclusion of cost incurred in printing additional polling agent forms by the Congress candidate as part of election expenditure and also cite the reasons thereof.
It also sought to know whether printing of polling agent forms by a candidate came under his or her election expenditure and the reasons thereof.
To this, the CEO�s office in a letter had replied that the expenditure incurred by the candidate or political party on printing of forms for appointment of polling agent, if any, should be included in the account of election expenditure.
The State Congress pointed out that there were 2,227 polling stations during the election to Nagaland�s lone Parliamentary constituency and about 4,600 polling agent forms were required by each contesting candidate for appointing two polling agents in each polling station.
However, the CEO�s office had issued 3,500 polling agent forms on March 26 to the election agents of the Congress candidate, creating a shortfall of 1,100 polling agent forms, it said.
The NPCC said the Congress candidate had to print additional polling agent forms by incurring an expenditure of Rs 1,300 to meet the shortfall of polling agent forms issued.
