As people voted in the Mizoram Assembly polls Wednesday, the powerful church-sponsored watchdog Mizoram People's Forum stole the show with the forum looking after the dos and don'ts by voters as well as political parties.
Mizoram recorded 75 per cent voter turnout.
It is probably the only state in the country with such a powerful civil body, which was duly appreciated by the state's Chief Electoral Officer Ashish Kundra during a press conference Wednesday.
The Mizoram People's Forum (MPF) was formed by the powerful Presbyterian Church Mizo Synod with the help of other major churches and civil societies on June 21, 2006 as an election watchdog to strive for electoral reforms.
Talking to PTI, C L Dawngliana, MPF leader at Venghnuai polling station in Aizawl South-II constituency, stated that they helped the voters in every possible way and the main task of searching one's number in the electoral rolls had been made easier due to issuance of photo voter slips by the election officials.
Earlier, political party workers used to sit in front of polling stations to help voters identify their numbers in the voters' list, but the practice was taken over by the MPF. We have been doing it without any partisan approach, he said.
At many polling stations across the state, benches were provided by the MPF so that people can sit while waiting for their turn.
During the campaigning for the state polls, local forums of the MPF had made public announcements across localities appealing to candidates and campaigners not to use money power to woo voters, besides asking politicians not to indulge in mud-slinging.
Those who had violated the points of agreements between the MPF and major political parties were publicly announced and condemned.
Any joint public meetings by candidates or political party leaders in the constituencies were chaired by MPF leaders, while community feasts by candidates or political parties during electioneering were publicly condemned.
Mizo Students Union Adviser Zuala said every political party is a signatory in MPF, which is a neutral body, and they have to follow their instructions such as how many number of posters, banners or flags have to be printed for campaigning.
"The MPF even specifies the sizes of the publicity material. Nobody can afford to violate that. The MPF agreement has in fact helped Mizoram achieve a complete, free, fair and peaceful elections over the years," he said.
Kundra said over 75 per cent votes were cast in the Mizoram Assembly polls Wednesday, but the figure was expected to rise as there were long queues of voters outside polling booths and information from some far-flung centres were yet to be updated.
The voting had started at 7 am and ended at 3 pm at Kanhmun, while it went went till 4 pm in the rest of Mizoram.
Mizoram has a total of 7,70,395 voters, including 3,94,897 women and 32,545 first timers, while there were 209 candidates in the fray for the 40-member Assembly.
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