1357 scribes out of total 4532 eligible voters in Press Club of India election cast their votes
After hectic campaigning of the day by the contesting candidates, the election of Press Club of INDIA came to halt at 6.30 PM today with 1357 journalist electorates who are the ordinary members of the PCI participating in the voting out of total 4532 eligible voters.
There was a single panel led by the incumbent president Gautam Lahiri in the fray comprising of five office bearers and 16 management committee members whereas the other contestants of opposition were fighting the election individually as independent candidates posing no serious threat to the incumbent panel considered to be a panel of progressive left tilt journalists.
The incumbent panel consisted of independent veteran journalist Gautam Lahiri for the post of president , Sangeeta Baruah Pisharoty for the post of Vice President from The Wire, Neeraj Thakur for Secretary General’s post from The Probe, Afzal Imam from Navbharat for joint secretaryship and Mohit Dubey for Treasurer from News Nation.
Apart from these five main office bearers the panel has also fielded its 16 candidates on all the posts of management committee.
The opposition president candidates were Arun Sharma and Atul while Prahlad Singh Rajput , Rahil contested for Vice President’s post. For Joint Secretary Swati Verma was the independent candidate while Naresh Gupta was contesting for the post of treasurer as independent. Chandrika Josi of All India Radio was also campaigning hectically the whole day for one of the posts .
The two candidates for the post of secretary general namely Lakshmi Devi ( PTI) and Shiraj Sahil were also contesting as independent trying their best to convince voters to cast votes in their favour.
The panel led by veteran journalist Gautam Lahiri was seen actively campaigning – convincing voters to vote for them explaining the the significant points of their manifesto regarding their outstanding achievements and future endeavours.
The voting till 2.00 PM was not so fast with only five hundred votes polled but after two PM the voters started coming in good numbers with the polling enhancing speedily going to 1357 votes by 6.30 PM.
This year’s voting was almost similar to last year’s voting in terms of numbers which unambiguously means that the chances of the incumbent panel seems to be be extremely bright with majority of the voters favouring the united incumbent panel broadly for stability, inclusivity and development which is the main slogan of the panel led by incumbent president of PCI Gautam Lahiri, rather than going for scattered independent candidates.
It may be recalled that last year the panel lead by Gautam Lahiri has won hands down on all the seats giving a huge defeat to the loose opposition panel.
One more good news is that in today’s election the membership annual renewal fees collection was Rs.14 lakhs not to speak of the entire day’s collection for booz and food items which might definitely be extremely encouraging keeping in view the crowd of voters.
Kindly recall that in 2022 election when Umakant Lakhera led panel had won in all the seats the total polling was 1,791 votes as against 1430 in 2021. The counting is on 11 November and by 4.00 PM the results will be officially announced.
The jubilant , entire panel members celebrating after the voting, their victory in advance,raising/ waving the victory sign with incumbent President Gautam Lehri in the midst at the club premises.
And Wrap on elections
