Lok Sabha Battle Prep: Election Commission of India Team Completes Tour of 5 States in 20 Days; Next Stop–J&K

Inching closer to the announcement of the Lok Sabha poll dates, a team of the Election Commission of India (ECI) has completed the tour of five states since February 16 and is likely to visit Jammu and Kashmir next week before declaring the schedule.

On Tuesday, the ECI team, headed by Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar, ended its tour in West Bengal.

Speaking to the media before wrapping up his tour, Kumar assured that violence will not be tolerated during the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. He said that strict instructions have been issued to the bureaucracy in the state. West Bengal has a history of both pre-and post-poll violence.

“There is no place for fear or intimidation in elections. Any partisan approach to the bureaucracy will not be tolerated. There is absolutely no tolerance for any form of violence in this celebration of democracy,” he said.

The CEC added that there is no place for money power and violence in the elections.

As per sources, the ECI team will visit Jammu and Kashmir next week.

The team has already visited Andhra Pradesh in January. Since February 16, it has been on back-to-back visits to Odisha, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, and Uttar Pradesh.

The ECI heads visit the states and union territories ahead of polls to ensure that all preparations are done properly for free and fair elections.

The terms of the Lok Sabha and the assemblies in Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Odisha, and Sikkim will end in June. These four states will witness simultaneous Lok Sabha and assembly elections. In 2019, the parliamentary polls were announced on March 10. The counting of votes took place on May 23.

The total electorate of India has reached 96.88 crores – the largest in the world. The poll body data shows that six states – Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Madhya Pradesh – have more than half of these voters. These six states collectively have more than 51 crore voters.

When compared to 2019, there has been an eight per cent increase in voters in 2024 – from 89.6 crore to 96.8 crore.