Chief Electoral Officer, Andaman and Nicobar Islands
1
The newspaper report of 2nd April 2014 captures the situation just days before the poll necessitating
the extensive Dry Run to check BSNL services on 7th April 2014.
Thanks to the effort put in by BSNL, the Election Department was able to communicate with 330 out of 386 polling station through BSNL services which was a huge improvement on the situation a few days earlier, However, these services were only the most basic and the level of barest minimum, in other words, they were just enough to make a telephone call or send an SMS.
Due to both the bandwidth constraints on a regular basis and the collapse of the main satellite, the first reaction of the Election department was it would be impossible to have IT based initiatives for the elections. The Election Commission was forwarding many instruction regarding updating information on the ECI portal/dashboard, sending information through the internet, live web casting etc. The officers, especially the younger ones like the RO and the DEOs were not willing to let adverse circumstances stop them from trying their level best. The IT department of the administration with the assistance of the NIC and the BSNL worked with the Election department to translate these into reality.
a) Live Web Casting
Thus, in spite of the almost non-existent bandwidth, the Election department was able to have live web casting from 5 polling stations on 10th April, 2014. It was for the first time in the history of these islands
that live steaming of any event was attempted. The feed was frequently interrupted but interestingly, while many people on these islands could not see it, it was clearly visible to people on the mainland, thanks to the uploading by the NIC on CEO website.
In order to achieve this BSNL had to diver bandwidth from elsewhere and 5 polling station locations was the maximum that could have been done.
Live webcasting from 5 Polling Stations. This was a very challenging task in this UT because of the very limited bandwidth. It was for the first time that live streaming of any event from these islands was done Snapshot of CEO’s Website showing links to Live Web casting
b) Mobile Application
The IT department developed a Mobile Application for all eligible voters to find out their polling station details by simply typing in their EPIC Number from their mobile phone. This application was free of cost and could be downloaded from the website.
c) Live Poll Monitoring
SMS BASED POLL MONITORING SYSTEM AND LIVE POLL DATA ON CEO WEBSITE
Besides the normal mode of collecting information on various parameters on the Poll day, this year the UT Election department in association with NIC and IT Department introduced a SMS based Polling Monitoring System for enabling continuous data collection of poll status from every Polling Stations through the registered Mobile number of the Presiding Officer and first Polling Officer. There were some polling stations in every district which were not accessible by mobile telephones and in those Polling Stations help of Police Radio was taken on the poll day in order to enable the office to compile the figures and to send periodical reports to the Election Commission of India at regular intervals.
Chief Electoral Officer, Andaman and Nicobar Islands
3 Snapshot of CEO’s Website with the poll day monitoring data available online
Snapshot of website also using the feed from CEO’s website to project live poll data on two hourly basis
Chief Electoral Officer, Andaman and Nicobar Islands
5 Methods of communication are very limited in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. There are very few private newspapers and that too none with high circulation. The All India Radio service is not available everywhere, and the local cable TV channels are not well developed. Mobile phones are therefore perhaps the most effective method of sharing information and for the first time, the Election department tied up with the UT
Information Technology Department to give regular uploads through SMS on counting results on 16th May
2014. This was a very popular initiative and most people depended on this for real time accurate information.
e)
The limitations of bandwidth and other constraints encouraged officers to frequently look for unusual solutions. Since it was difficult to communicate even within the districts and from Port Blair with all the officers, especially those in remote areas, it was decided to create a group e-mail on which all communication was uploaded. All the officers were given the password of this group email on Google. The officers were in touch with each other on Whatsapp and all the detailed instructions, handbook, manual and compendium of the Election Commission was placed on Google Cloud because it was easier to access. As already mentioned, Google Earth was extensively utilised to map the coordinates of the polling stations. However, many applications such as Whatsapp could be downloaded either on the mainland or in Port Blair on a very good day.All these initiatives were very unique for these islands and had not been attempted before. It was
matter of great pride when on Poll day and Counting day, all these initiatives were implemented
smoothly and successfully. This has given enormous confidence to the officers in this Administration, in
turn providing a boost to all e-initiatives.
Chief Electoral Officer, Andaman and Nicobar Islands
7
o New website of CEO ANI (snapshot at prepage)
o Online enrolment from this website
o Online enrolment facility from all the Citzien’s Service Centres (e-governance)
o SMS alerts to check a person’s status on the Electoral Roll, EPIC number and Polling Station.
