Imphal, For the first time in India, 16.4 per cent all-women managed polling stations of the total of 2,968 would be set up in Manipur and in five assembly constituencies, all the polling stations would be managed exclusively by women polling personnel, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sushil Chandra announced here on Tuesday.

The CEC said that 487 all-women managed polling stations would be set up in Manipur and in five assembly constituencies -- Singjamei, Thoubal, Yaiskul, Wangkhei, Churachandpur -- all the polling stations would be managed exclusively by the women polling staff and women security personnel would be deployed in many of these stations.

"The initiative had been taken up for the first time in India to provide a comfortable experience to women voters and better participation of women in the election process. Despite a lot of logistical challenges, these maiden steps would facilitate empowerment of women and boost gender equality in the election process," Chandra told the media.

He said that 115 model polling stations would be set up in the state and assured minimum facilities like water, electricity, toilets, and ramps would be made available in these polling stations.

Mentioning that conducting inducement-free and ethical elections is of prime importance for the Election Commission, the CEC said that the district and enforcement agency officials have been instructed to monitor expenditure sensitive constituencies and ensure comprehensive, coordinated actions.

He informed that seizures of various illegally procured items worth Rs 97.6 crore have been made in the state since the announcement of the elections on January 8. The seizure included Rs 1.48 crore of cash, liquor worth Rs 40 lakh, various narcotics worth Rs 81.5 crore, freebies and gold worth Rs 14.2 crore.

Stressing on the importance of publishing criminal antecedents of the candidates, the CEC stressed that candidates having criminal antecedent (whether independent or sponsored by any political party) and Political Parties sponsoring such candidates are required to publish detailed information including their past history of criminal activities. "It is also mandatory for political parties to publicize in the newspaper, social media and upload on their website detailed information regarding individuals with pending criminal cases selected as candidates, along with reason for such selection, as also why other individuals without criminal antecedents could not be selected as candidates," he added.

Chandra said that webcasting would be arranged in 2,400 out of 2,968 polling stations (over 80 per cent) across the state and the remaining will be covered with offline videography to ensure smooth conduct of elections.

The CEC accompanied by Election Commissioners Rajiv Kumar, Anup Chandra Pandey and senior officials of the Commission arrived in the poll bound Manipur on Monday on a two day visit and held a series of meetings with the political parties and senior officials to review the assembly election preparations.

The 60-member Manipur Assembly will go to the polls in two phases on February 27 and March 3, while the counting of votes will take place on March 10.