Cucsu elections: voting in 60 rooms across five faculties

Chittagong University is set to hold its central student union (Cucsu) and hall council elections across five faculties: Social Sciences, Old Arts, New Arts, Business Administration, and Science. 

Voting will take place in 60 polling stations spread across 15 centres within these faculties. Each station will have five ballot boxes, four for the Cucsu election and one for the hall council, accommodating up to 500 voters, with each voter expected to spend around 10 minutes casting their vote.

Election Commissioner and Member Secretary Prof A K M  Ariful Haque Siddique confirmed the arrangements and detailed the designated voting centres. 

In the Old Arts Faculty, polling will be held at Sohrawardi Hall, while the New Arts Faculty will host elections at Shahjalal, A F Rahman, and Alaul Halls. In the Science Faculty, Shah Amanat, Shaheed Abdur Rab, and Masterda Surya Sen Halls have been selected as polling locations.

In the Social Sciences Faculty, voters will cast their ballots at Nawab Faizunnesa, Shamsunnahar, Deshnetri Begum Khaleda Zia, and Atish Dipankar Halls. Meanwhile, the Business Administration Faculty will conduct voting at Preetilata, Bijoy 24, and Shaheed Farhad Hossain Halls, as well as the Shilpi Rashid Chowdhury Hostel. 

Prof Siddique emphasised that these arrangements are part of a comprehensive plan to ensure smooth and organised elections across all faculties.

He added that efforts are ongoing to bring the entire campus under CCTV surveillance with external agencies, though no organisation has yet been formally assigned the task. To prevent electoral fraud, ballot papers will carry a security code. 

Saidur Rahman Chowdhury, Director of the ICT Cell, explained that this code will verify the authenticity of ballot papers and immediately detect any external or counterfeit papers processed through OMR machines.