DMK leaders conduct statewide training for counting agents

Chennai: DMK conducted statewide training sessions on Sunday for its counting agents, focusing on procedures to be followed inside counting centres. With 62 counting centres set up across Tamil Nadu, party leadership had earlier directed senior functionaries to brief agents thoroughly. Following this, ministers and district-level leaders held meetings on Sunday to ensure uniform adherence to guidelines.Party sources said there will be one agent to a table. Since there would be a minimum of 16 tables set up in each counting centre, there will be as many agents. This includes 14 for EVMs, one for postal ballots and one table for the assistant returning officer (ARO). The number of agents will increase based on the number of postal votes, as only 500 postal votes will be counted at a table. "In case a constituency has 3,000 postal votes, there will be six tables exclusively to count such votes and as many agents," said a DMK leader.Training sessions were led by organisational secretary R S Bharathi and legal wing secretary N R Elango. Bharathi said agents were given three key instructions: verify that strong room seals are intact, ensure that the serial numbers on EVM pink slips match the machines, and check the integrity of the green paper seal inside the EVMs. "The green slip should be intact and if it is broken, it means the votes were tampered," Bharathi said.Agents were also asked to cross-check vote counts with Form 17C, which records the total number of votes polled at each booth. "We have been instructed to match Form 17C data with round-wise counting figures to ensure there are no discrepancies," said a party agent.The exercise is part of DMK's effort to maintain close monitoring of the counting process across centres.