Election Commission Estimates ₹520 Crore for Lok Sabha Polls in Karnataka

Election Commission Estimates ₹520 Crore for Lok Sabha Polls in Karnataka

Mangalore Today News Network

Bengaluru, April 7, 2024: The upcoming Lok Sabha elections are estimated to incur an average expenditure of over ₹18.5 crore per Member of Parliament, according to the Election Commission (EC). The EC predicts the total expenses for conducting the polls across 28 Parliamentary constituencies to be approximately ₹520 crore.

Official sources have revealed that the State’s Finance Department has already sanctioned around ₹400 crore, with the remainder to be released based on actual costs.

Voter awareness rally held in Mangaluru on Saturday

Comparatively, during the previous year’s Assembly polls, the EC spent ₹511 crore, averaging ₹2.2 crore per Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA). Sources suggest that this year’s Lok Sabha elections are expected to cost around ₹7 to ₹8 crore more than the Assembly polls due to recentness and similarity in scale.

In the 2018 Assembly election, the EC’s expenses totaled around ₹394 crore, averaging ₹1.75 crore per constituency. This marked a significant increase from the 2013 election, which incurred expenses of around ₹160 crore, averaging ₹65 lakh per constituency.

For the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the EC spent approximately ₹413 crore, averaging around ₹14.75 crore per parliamentary constituency. This was notably higher than the 2014 election, which had expenses of ₹320.16 crore, averaging over ₹11 crore per parliamentary constituency, attributed to inflation and rising costs of poll machinery and infrastructure.

The majority of the budget will be allocated to remuneration, training of polling personnel (approximately three lakh to be deployed), election observers, transport arrangements (including provision for voters with disabilities), preparation of electoral rolls and polling stations, and voter awareness campaigns. Key expenses include hiring vehicles, printing voter slips and voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) slips, and EPIC cards.

To ensure the integrity of the elections, web-casting will be implemented in critical and sensitive polling stations, counting centers, and police checkposts where an internet connection is available, with additional videography utilizing fixed cameras. Expenses will also be incurred on the counting day and for strong room arrangements.

Furthermore, voter awareness campaigns, distribution of voter slips prior to the election date, and the use of VVPAT have contributed to increased expenditures. Additionally, the voter population has risen from 4.6 crore in 2014 to 5.40 crore in the present year, with the number of polling booths increasing from 54,264 in 2014 to 58,871 (including 37 auxiliary polling stations), thereby augmenting expenses related to poll consumables and infrastructure.