Arunchal Panchayat and Municipal polls on May 16

The Panchayat and Municipal elections in Arunachal Pradesh will be held on May 16, State Election Commissioner said today.
While panchayat elections will be conducted in all Assembly constituencies, Municipal elections will be held only for Itanagar and Pasighat in East Siang district, said K D Singh, the State Election Commissioner, here today.
Notification for the elections will be issued on April 16 and the Model Code of Conduct will come into force from the same day, he said.
Polls across the state for panchayats and municipalities will be simultaneously conducted on May 16 and counting of votes will be done on May 21 next.

"Adult franchise is a democratic right of a citizen, which cannot be extended as the current Panchayat Raj term ends on June 31 next.
Therefore, constitutional obligation necessitates for conduct of the Panchayati Raj elections in time before the term ends," Singh said.

A total of 5,83,409 voters will exercise their franchise for 7403 Gram Panchayats, 1785 Anchal Samities and 177 Zilla Parishads, in 1841 polling stations.
While, 61,493 voters will exercise their franchise for the Itanagar Municipality, which has been divided into 30 wards with 10 wards reserved for women.
For the Pasighat Municipality, 9,683 voters will poll across 12 wards of which, 4 are reserved for women.

The Election Commissioner informed that, ballot papers will be used for the voting process for Panchayat elections while Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) will be used for the municipal elections.