EC increases remuneration, honorarium for poll duty staffers

NEW DELHI: EC on Friday raised remuneration of officers and staff involved in conduct of polls, while also revising honorarium for deputy district election officers (DEOs) and CAPF personnel engaged in election security.

As per the revised rates, a presiding officer will get daily remuneration of Rs 500, up from Rs 350; a polling officer will receive Rs 400 per day or a lump sum of Rs 1,600, as against Rs 250 per day earlier; a counting assistant will get Rs 450 per day or a lump sum of Rs 1,350, up from Rs 250 per day; Class IV employees requisitioned for poll duty from central/state govt, PSUs and local authorities will get Rs 350 a day or a lump sum of Rs 1,400/1,000; members of the video surveillance teams, media certification teams and expenditure monitoring cell, etc will be paid a lump sum of Rs 3,000/2,000, as against Rs 1,200/1,000; and micro-observers' lump sum payment has been doubled to Rs 2,000.

Deputy DEOs will now be paid an honorarium not less than their month's basic pay (they currently get none), while gazetted officers of CAPFs will be paid Rs 4,000 (up from Rs 2,500) if deployed for 15 days or less and Rs 2,000 per week (up from Rs 1,250) for duties lasting more than 15 days. Subordinate officers of CAPFs will receive Rs 3,000 if on duty for up to 15 days and Rs 1,500 per week for more than 15 days. Other CAPF ranks will get an honorarium of Rs 2,500 (for 15 days or less) and Rs 1,250 per week (for over 15 days), as against Rs 1,500 and Rs 750 paid currently.