Deputy EC holds NERPAP review meeting

A meeting of all Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) of western region states was held here today to review preparations for the National Electoral Purification and Authentication Programme (NERPAP) drive announced by the Chief Election Commissioner recently.
According to an official release issued here, the review meeting was held under the chairmanship of Deputy Election Commissioner Vinod Zutshi and two other Deputy Election Commissioners namely Sudhir Tripathi and Umesh Sinha.
Besides, Gujarat Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Anita Karwal, CEOs of Maharashtra, Goa, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh as well as the Union Territory of Daman and Diu were also present during the meeting.

After the meeting, Zutshi said that the drive is aimed at rectifying errors and anomalies in electoral roles such as duplication of names in the rolls as well as errors in details of voters.
He added that one of the main objective of the drive is to complete the linking of Aadhaar Card with the voter identification card before August 15, the release said.
He also lauded efforts made by Gujarat in issuing Aadhaar cards, saying that around 64 per cent eligible citizens have been issued cards in the state, it said.

"Gujarat has always remained in the forefront to take up initiatives and that is why we organised the first meeting of western region states here. When 64 per cent people have been already given Aadhaar cards here, this drive of rectifying electoral rolls will move faster," he was quoted as saying.

Gujarat CEO Anita Karwal said that around 3 crore voters have been given either Aaadhaar card or enrollment ID numbers in the state.
So far, 66 lakh citizens were identified and their registration process have been completed, it said.