Gandhinagar, Nov 3 (IANS): The Election Commission has made all preparations amid the pandemic for the by-polls scheduled to be held on Tuesday for eight Assembly constituencies, officials said.

The by elections are to be held for Abdasa, Dhari, Dangs, Gadhada, Kaprada, Karjan, Limdi and Morbi assembly seats.

There are a total of 18,75,032 voters in all the eight constituencies where the by-elections were necessitated due to the resignations of Congress legislators.

There are 9,69,834 male voters and 9,05,170 female voters.

The polling will begin from 7 a.m. in the morning and end at 6 p.m.

As this is the first time that the elections are being held amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the administration has adequately prepared itself for the guidelines to be followed in the circumstances.

There are a total of 1,807 polling centres and 3,024 polling booths, where only one thousand voters will be allowed to exercise their rights in a single booth.

All the booths have been marked with signages for voter's queues and other staff too, to maintain social (physical) distancing.

These booths have been facilitated with more than 8 thousand Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) kits. Other than that, more than 41 thousand rubber gloves for the elections officials and staff have been provided. No voter will be allowed to touch the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) without the use of gloves. For this, more than 21 lakh polyethylene gloves have provided.

Moreover, the booths have been facilitated with more than 82 thousand surgical masks and 41 thousand face Shields. Apart from that, 34 thousand thermal guns have been provided. Over 41 thousand N95 masks have also been procured for the election duty officials.

Election Commission has banned all type of exit polls and opinion polls.