Rajasthan election duty arrangements have triggered a dispute over the designation of college teachers and the ability of government employees to vote in panchayat elections, with teachers’ representatives asking the State Election Commission to revise deployment rosters.
The Rajasthan University and College Teachers’ Association has urged the State Election Commission to assign government college teachers election duties according to their designation, pay scale and official status. The association said professors had been appointed as returning officers and polling officers in three districts despite Election Commission guidelines, and sought their deployment as zonal or sector magistrates instead.
RUCTA state general secretary Baney Singh said the issue had surfaced in Sawai Madhopur, Sirohi and Dungarpur. Officials in the districts had cited staff shortages as the reason for appointing college teachers to the posts, according to the report. Singh said the association was concerned about the treatment of senior teaching staff during election assignments and alleged that lower-level officials harassed them while they were on duty.
“Lower-level officials harass us during election duties. We want duties to be assigned according to our pay scale, status, and dignity,” Singh said.
State Election Commission secretary Rajesh Verma said returning officers were gazetted officers and that personnel from different levels could be appointed to the posts. He said assignments were made according to administrative requirements, adding that there were limited positions for divisional and sector magistrates.
The dispute highlights how election staffing depends on the availability of government personnel across districts. While the teachers’ association has sought a clearer link between an employee’s designation and the post assigned, the commission has said deployment is determined by operational requirements and the number of available posts.
A separate concern has emerged in Churu, where government teachers and other employees fear they may be unable to vote because their election duties have been assigned on polling day in their home constituencies. Teachers’ representative Ramanand Pareek asked the district administration to prepare duty rosters using employees’ wards and polling stations so that they could vote while carrying out election responsibilities.
“No employee should be deprived of their right to vote because of election duty. The administration has all the necessary data to prepare the roster accordingly,” Pareek said.
Verma said personnel were required to perform their assigned election duties and that there was no provision for postal ballots in sarpanch elections. The commission’s position leaves duty allocation and roster planning as the principal administrative mechanisms available to address conflicts between election work and employees’ own voting arrangements.
