Clouded leopards to be EC mascot for electoral roll revision

SHILLONG: The clouded leopard, which made the Himalayan region and Meghalaya in particular its home, was today made election mascot by the Election Commission to create awareness among voters during the launch of SVEEP activities under National Electoral Rolls Purification Programme ( NERP).

The Commission targeted to enroll over 1.78 lakh voters during the campaign including over 82,000 new voters.

According to Chief Election Officer F R Kharkongor, over 16.59 lakh voters have registered with a deficit of 1.28 lakh people, who are yet to be enrolled with the EC.

Kharkongor said the clouded leopard was chosen to be the election mascot to create awareness among voters.

Mark, the male mascot, would be accompanied by the female mascot Markor (precious) signifying that rights, choice and votes were precious and would adorn the tribal dresses of Khasis, Jaintias and Garos, Kharkongor said.

Dolyne Kharbhih of Nongsder village in Ri-Bhoi, who became the second woman from the state to scale the Mount Everest, was one among the 'icons' engaged in the SVEEP campaign.

According to the CEO, the EC has introduced a unique software aimed at detecting as many as 17 types of errors in the electoral rolls.

Use of the software would enable us to remove and ensure errors like existence of names in more than one place, multiple entries, shifts and deaths, he added.