Days after transferring the Director General of Police (DGP) of West Bengal and Kolkata Police Commissioner, the Election Commission on Wednesday ordered the appointment of five IPS officers, all deputy inspector general (DIG) rank officers, to key areas in the state ahead of the Assembly elections.In a letter to Chief Secretary Dushyant Nariala, the commission directed Rathod Amitkumar Bharat be posted as the DIG of Raiganj Range and Anjali Singh as the DIG, Jalpaiguri Range, both in north Bengal, where the BJP has emerged strong in the last few elections.Ajeet Singh Yadav, who was stationed as a Superintendent of Police in the Department of Economic Offences, has been posted in the volatile Murshidabad range.For the crucial Presidency range — which covers the entire South 24-Parganas, parts of North 24-Parganas and Howrah rural areas — the commission has posted Kankar Prasad Barui as the DIG; while Srihari Pandey will be the new DIG of the Burdwan range. The areas under these two ranges are strongholds of the Trinamool Congress.Meanwhile, the EC has also appointed 13 IAS officers as district magistrates (DMs), who will also serve as district election officers (DEOs).So far, more than 25 lakh election officials have been deployed in the state to ensure smooth and orderly progress of the various phases of elections in five states and UTs. Over 17.4 crore voters are eligible to vote in these upcoming Assembly elections. Thus, the deployment amounts to nearly one election official for every 70 electors.The deployed personnel include nearly 15 lakh polling personnel, 8.5 lakh security personnel, 40,000 counting personnel, 49,000 micro observers, 21,000 sector officers and 15,000 micro-observers for counting amongst other officials. All the deployed personnel shall be deemed to be on deputation to the Election Commission as per the provisions of Section 28A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.As many as 1,111 Central observers have been deployed across the 832 Assembly constituencies to function as the eyes and ears of the commission. These included 557 general observers, 188 police observers and 366 expenditure observers. Most of these central observers have already reached their assigned constituencies.