Kerala Govt to spend Rs 200 crore on local body polls

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Elections are a costly affair. Setting up booths, ensuring facilities, paying poll officers, everything costs money. This local body elections, the state government will be spending around Rs 200 crore, up from the nearly Rs 169 crore that it spent in the 2020 elections. For a state that has 2.83 crore eligible voters this time, it would come to about Rs 70 per vote. The money would cover a range of expensesfrom EVMs and stationery to officers training, logistics, polling station arrangements and remuneration for the poll officers. Why the escalation? Inflation and increase in voter base are among the reasons for the cost escalation, say sources. This time, Kerala has 2.86 crore people eligible to vote in the December polls. In 2020, this was 2.76 crore voters. Elections to local self-government bodies require more manpower and establishment arrangements. As per the present estimate, the spending will be about Rs 200 crore, maybe even higher. It is natural for costs to go up each successive election. The cost of materials and arrangements, be it training programmes or stationery items, will be higher than what it was five years ago, a source says. As per the source, many of the payments are of an urgent nature, like that for logistics or arrangements at booths like lighting, water or cleaning up the premises. Steady rise In the 2015 elections, the government spent Rs 88 crore, a 35% rise from the Rs 65 crore it spent in the 2010 elections. The 2020 elections witnessed a 92% rise from the previous election. However, the Rs 168.82 crore the government spent in 2020 did not cover all poll-related expenses, like salary and establishment costs of State Election Commission, which came to around Rs 4.10 crore that year.