Kakinada, May 11^th: As many as 2,000 poll staff and 600 police personnel were appointed for the smooth conduct of centralized counting scheduled to be held on May 16 in East Godavari district for 19 assembly segments and 10 parliament seats. Of them nearly 1,500 belong to Kakinada and the rest are summoned from other places. The district administration is confident of declaring the results by 12 noon on the day.

Counting for Kakinada, Amalapuram and Rajahmundry parliamentary constituencies and the assembly segments falling under them will be taken up in Kakinada. Beside this the counting for Ramachandrapuram and its parliamentary constituency and also for the neighboring Visakha constituency will also be held at Kakinada. The counting for Amalapuram constituency and its Assembly segments will b done at MSN Charities. For Kakinada parliament and Assembly segments the counting will be held at V S Lakshmi Degree College for Women. Counting for Rajahmundry constituency will be taken up at RMC and GPT.

To avoid any kind of malpractice the allotment of counting centers to the staff will be done a couple of hours before the counting starts at 8am. The allotment will be done through randomization. The staff will receive messages to their mobile phone and they can also know the same by calling to phone numbers 9618203159, 9618203163, 9618203165 and 9618203170.

According to the district election officer and collector, Mr. Gopala Krishna Dwevedi the staff will have to reach the allotted places by 7am on the day and should be there at their allotted seats by 7.30am. Staff coming from other places were asked to reach Kakinada by May 15 night to avoid rush. The counting process starts at 8 am with the postal ballot count and the counting of EVMs will start at 8.15 am in the presence of agents of political parties.