New Delhi, March 16 (HBTV): The Election Commission of India today has announced that Lok Sabha election 2024 will be held in seven phases beginning from April 19. The counting will be on June 4. The phase-1 polling will be held on April 19, the second phase on April 26, third phase on May 7, fourth phase on May 13, 5th phase on May 20, 6th phase on May 25 and the last and the 7th phase on June 1.

The announcements come within 24 hours of two new election commissioners -- Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Sandhu -- taking charge.

Briefing the media on the preparedness for the election, the Chief Election Commission (CEC) Rajiv Kumar informed that 97 crore registered voters including 47.1 crore women will be able to exercise their franchise. 55 lakh EVMS will be used in the entire exercise. Voters above 85 years and persons with disabilities with 40% benchmark disability can vote from home. Vote from home option was availed in some of the assembly elections but this is the first time that this will be held across the county in the general election.

Talking about the challenges of 4Ms -- Muscle, Money, Misinformation, MCC violation, the CEC said the EC is committed to curbing violence. He also informed that there will be drone-based checking at some international borders, a network of checkpoints has been set up across the country.

EC will take differential treatment in each state to stop the misuse of money. For this, the EC has already held meeting with agencies and freebies need to be cracked down. Banks will be sending daily report of suspicious transactions, CEC said.

Political parties have been asked to hand out MCC guidelines to all the star campaigners. “Please avoid creating digital memory of the bad words coming out of your mouth,” the CEC said in a warning for campaigners.