For the first time in the history of elections in India, an all-woman team of general observers has been assigned the task of conducting free and fair polls in Goa.
While finalising poll schedules for five States, the Election Commission has posted 20 election observers in Goa, all of whom are women, EC sources here said.
This is for the first time ever that the EC has put an all-woman team in charge of conducting elections in any State.
Males are conspicuously absent from this group of general observers though they figure in the list of expenditure observers the EC has appointed for overseeing flow of funds during campaigning in Goa.
The all-woman team of general observers includes three officers each from Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, two each from Haryana and Chhattisgarh and one each from Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Maharashtra.
The decision to appoint an all-woman team of bureaucrats as election observers in Goa comes in the wake of certain complaints the EC received in the past over the conduct of senior male bureaucrats .