In a tragic incident, Sushil Kumar Acharya, a school teacher on election duty in Odisha’s Bolangir district, passed away due to a heart attack at a polling party disbursal centre in Titlagarh on Sunday.
Acharya, aged 52, suddenly fell unconscious while at the disbursal centre. He was immediately rushed to Titlagarh hospital, where doctors declared him dead, according to an official.
Meanwhile, Chief Electoral Officer Nikunja Bihari Dhal expressed his condolences over the unfortunate event. The Election Commission has announced that the deceased’s family will receive an ex gratia payment of Rs 15 lakh. Dhal has instructed the Bolangir collector to expedite the formalities to ensure the prompt disbursal of the compensation to Acharya’s family.
Earlier, the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) also announced an ex-gratia of Rs 15 lakh to the next of kin of a government employee, who died during election duty.
The deceased identified as Alekh Randhari, a class-IV employee of a government school, died in a road accident near Swami Vivekananda Vidyamandir in Nabarangpur district while he was on the way to a polling station for the fourth phase elections.
5 Lok Sabha seats and 35 Assembly seats will go to polls tomorrow in Odisha
In the fifth phase of the Lok Sabha elections, five Lok Sabha seats and 35 Assembly seats of Odisha will go to polls tomorrow. The arrangements of security have been made for all the polling stations, officials said.
This is the second phase of polling for the state in which over 70.69 lakh voters, including 40.33 lakh men, 39.35 lakh women and 851 transgender persons, are eligible to cast their votes. 9,162 polling stations across Lok Sabha and Assembly seats have been constituted. Of the 9,162 polling stations, 1,541 will be model polling stations, while 1,041 will be managed by all-woman personnel and 25 will be run by PwD officials. Nearly 20 per cent of the 9,162 polling stations have been identified as critical, including those in Naxalite-hit areas.