The Election  Commission of India (ECI) has allowed personnel engaged in various essential services to cast their votes through postal ballots. The decision has been welcomed by the Journalists’ Forum Assam (JFA), according to which thousands of journalists could not vote due to their professional duties.

It may be mentioned here that as most of the journalists are stationed at their non-native places, hence they could not vote during the elections.

“The media persons often missed the opportunity to exercise their voting rights as they cannot leave the workplace on the poll day and thus a large number of valuable votes had gone waste,” said JFA President Rupam Barua and Secretary Nava Thakuria.

“It is now the turn for scribes to show sincerity towards the ECI opportunity,” they added.

Apart from the journalists, others who would be able to vote via postal ballots are those who are employed in various essential services like electricity, health department, telecom, railways, aviation, fire, ambulance, shipping services etc.