9th class boy performs election duty

Nagarkurnool: During the last phase of gram panchayat elections, a 9th class boy from Sripur village was found engaged in the election duty in Nagarkurnool mandal of the district on Wednesday. 

Mahesh of Class 9, from Sirpur village was appointed by the polling booth staff to perform election duty at the 16th polling booth of Sripur gram panchayat, as they found shortage of polling staff to perform the election duty. 

Mahesh sitting alongside the other election officials was seen applying ink on the fingers of voters after they cast their votes. Voters and onlookers, who were surprised, when tried to enquire about it, the polling booth officials tried to cover it up by saying they had appointed the boy as they had shortage of election staff. 

This clearly tells that despite the higher election officials in the district have taken enough precautions to ensure that adequate election staff are posted at the polling booths, some of the staff had failed to report to their duties and in unavoidable situations, the polling station staff were forced to appoint someone or the other. In this case, they had appointed a minor boy to perform the services which is against the rules.