SYMBOLS

General elections, 1996 _ Publicity of Candidate's name and symbol.

Election Commission's letter No.437/2/96/MCS(B)/ dated 24th April, 1996, addressed to (1) the Director General, Doordarshan, New Delhi, and (2) the Director General, All India Radio, New Delhi, and Repeated to Chief Electoral Officers of all States and Union Territories.
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Subject: General Elections, 1996-Publicity of Candidate's name and symbol.

After taking into consideration the overall subdued campaign in the country, the Commission has decided that in order to increase the awareness of the voters about the names of the contesting candidates and the symbols allotted to each of the, adequate publicity of the same needs to be given on the All India Radio and Doordarshan.

All the Regional Kendras of the All India Radio and Doordarshan may give publicity of this in the following manner.

On the Regional Kendras of Doordarshan, a list of the candidates along with their symbols in alphabetical order may be displayed by projecting on screen a dummy copy of the ballot paper moving at constant speed slowly either across (horizontally) or from top to bottom (vertically). The name and symbols may also be announced through voice over in this sequence. CEOs may make a available a dummy copy each of the Ballot paper to the concerned Regional Kendras under proper acknowledgement for use with the strictest security. In this connection attention in invited to Para 7 of chapter XI of Hand Book for Returning Officers extracted below.

Dummy ballot papers

7. There is no objection to printing of dummy ballot papers by candidates/political parties. A dummy ballot paper should not. however resemble in any manner the genuine ballot paper in size and colour. It can be printed on any colour other than pink and white, such as brown, yellow or grey so as to avoid any confusion to an ignorant or illiterate voter who might take these ballot papers to be genuine and try to put them into the ballot box. There is also no objection for a candidate printing a dummy ballot paper using his own name and symbol indicating the place where they would appear in the ballot paper to be used at the election, but it should not contain the actual names and symbol of the other contesting candidates in the constituency.

The dummy ballot paper may be of any color other than white or pink. Also the letter "DUMMY" should be boldly superscribed on the dummy ballot paper.

The Regional Kendras of All India Radio will announce the names and symbols exactly in the same sequence as is given in the dummy Ballot paper.

In both the cases description of the symbol should be as given by the Returning Officer in the relevant Statutory Report submitted to the Commission.

The concerned Station Director should immediately get in touch with the CEO of the State/Union Territory concerned and obtain a copy each of the dummy Ballot paper for the Constituencies-Parliament and Assembly segments, the letter, wherever elections to the assembly seats are simultaneously being held either on account of General Elections or on account of Bye-election.

The announcements may be made daily ending with the date of campaign Suitable phasing of the announcement may be done so as to cover the constituencies going to poll on the 27th of this month being covered in the first phase, those scheduled for the 2nd of May, 1996 being taken up next and those scheduled for the 7th of May 1996 and later being up in the third phase.

CEOs are being requested to provide necessary assistance in the matter.

Copy forwarded to:

CEOs of all States and Union Territories to provide a copy each of the Ballot paper to the station directors of the Regional Kendras of All India Radio and Doordarshan in their respective region and also make available the list of symbols (descriptions of each symbol) as given in the Statutory Forms.



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