Booth level officers (BLOs) Wednesday urged authorities to make them eligible for an additional month’s salary at par with other government employees who attended poll duties.
The government had announced a month’s additional salariesto employees sent for election duties during the recently concluded generalelections, but BLOs were left out from this benefit.
A group of BLOs under the banner of Booth Level OfficersAssociation, led by its chairman Fayaz Ahmad Rather said that each and everyBLO is always put under strict instructions by election commission to remainpresent in their assigned polling booths on the day of voting.
BLOs are government employees working in differentdepartments. In addition to their own duties at parent departments, they areresponsible for electoral registration process and of the electoral rolls inareas assigned to them.
A BLO is a local government or semi-government official,familiar with the local electors and generally a voter in the same polling areawho assists in updating the electoral roll using his local knowledge.
BLOs are also representatives of the Election Commission ofIndia (ECI) at the grass-root level who play a pivotal role in the process ofroll revision and collecting actual field information from their respectivepolling areas.
“During the last year’s Panchayat and Municipal Elections,BLOs, apart from performing electoral registration process in their respectiveareas, were directed by election authorities to remain present at pollingbooths and establish BLO’s help desk there. We did that,” said Fayaz AhmadRather, chairman of the BLOs association.
He added that their demand for eligibility for additionalone month salary is genuine and based on justice, arguing: “Under theprovisions of section 13C of Representation of People Act 1950, District ElectionCommissioner (deputy commissioners), assistant electoral registration officer(tehsildars), and electoral registration officer (SDM), all are deemed to be ondeputation to election commission and have been eligible for one month’sadditional salary which has been paid to them.
BLOs are part and parcel of this whole process but have beenleft out.”
Rather rued that leaving BLOs out is sheer injustice totheir hard work and dignity.
The association appealed authorities to make them eligiblefor a month’s additional salary.