BENGALURU: For the first time ever, the Chief Electoral Office has developed a Geo Information System-enabled mobile application called Chunavana to help voters find polling stations. The application, which was used on a pilot basis last election, was relaunched with new features on Tuesday by Chief Electoral Officer of Karnataka Sanjiv Kumar.
According to Kumar, the app will guide the voter to their polling station. By entering the EPIC number one can also find the nearest police station and hospital in case of emergency, details of candidates contesting along with their photos and educational qualification.
The app will also help senior citizens and differently-abled voters book wheelchairs and a vehicle to pick and drop them to the stations. “We want them to book at the earliest so that we can make arrangements. In 2018, we had brought 14,000 wheelchairs and 13,000 more wheelchairs were brought by other departments,” Kumar said. One mobile user can book wheelchairs for a maximum of five EPIC numbers.
On the voting day, one can use the app to check the status of the queue also. On the counting day, the app will be updated every two hours. The app can be downloaded using Google Play (Android users) and App store (Apple users). It is available in Kannada and English.