Assembly elections in Punjab are likely to be held in the last week of January or first week of February next year, state chief electoral officer (CEO) V K Singh said in Chandigarh, although no exact date is of Punjab assembly elections is announced yet. Singh said that the election department was making all preparations for the assembly elections.

“A special campaign for revision of electoral rolls from September 7 to October 7 will be held. The campaign is to include names of all eligible voters. People have been asked to get their vote made before January 2 next year. This process has to be completed before nomination process for the election starts,” he said.

“According to the data, there should have been 1.99 crore eligible voters (those above 18 years). However, the registered voters with us are 1.92 crore. “In 2014 parliamentary elections, there were 1.96 crore voters. After Aadhaar-based screening, nearly 4 lakh votes deleted from rolls as these were duplicate voters or people have died,” he noted.

“A special campaign in colleges and other places is being carried out to enroll new voters,” Singh added.

A new political outfit, Awaaz-e-Punjab, was announced by cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu last week. The Akali Dal-BJP combine, who has been in power in the state since 2007, will take a third shot at power in the next assembly polls.