Bangladesh
Vote | Security There will be 650,000 members of law and order forces in the polling field
Own Correspondent, Dhaka, 14 November 2023: Around 650,000 members of the law and order forces will be on duty in the upcoming 12th National Parliament elections. A draft information in this regard has been given to the Election Commission (EC) by the Ministry of Home Affairs. Thousands of crores of takas have been demanded for law and order forces to fulfill their duties.
It has been found that among the law and order forces, 1 lakh 1 thousand policemen, 4 lakh 46 thousand and 41 thousand village policemen of Ansar forces will be on duty. Besides, 2 thousand 210 platoons of different forces (66 thousand 300 members) will perform the duty of voting. Among them BGB 1 thousand 106 platoons (30 people per platoon); Coast Guard 42 platoons, RAB 600 platoons, Army 414 platoons and Navy 48 platoons.
According to EC sources, besides maintaining law and order, the expenses of polling officers and officials associated with the conduct of elections will increase in various sectors. The Election Commission has decided to pay twice as much as the last election for polling allowances of around 9 lakh presiding, assistant presiding and polling officers. Besides, they will get an additional 1000 taka each for travel. Expenditure on allowance of polling officers alone has increased by Tk 280 crore compared to the last election. Including these, the potential expenditure in the election management sector stands at more than Tk 1 thousand crore.
Besides, another Tk 135 crore is being spent on electoral training. In total, the expenditure of the 12th National Assembly elections is estimated to be more than 2 thousand 300 crore rupees. Although in the 11th National Assembly elections, law and order and election management - these two sectors were allocated Tk 700 crore. Later it increased.
Some EC officials, who did not wish to be named, said that the amount of money demanded from the law enforcement agencies is usually not fully paid. How many members of a force will be in the field for how many days in the election; The amount of money allocated depends on it. The same happened in the last election. However, the EC wants to keep police patrolling in the field until 15 days after the polling. This is one of the reasons for the increase in spending on law and order.
