By Sarah Hannan The marking of postal votes for the upcoming presidential election will be held on 31 October and 1 November by certifying officers in 1,920 centres. The centres will function as regular polling booths and the necessary facilities will be made available similar to a regular polling booth. Elections monitoring teams will visit the centres, and an assistant returning officer will be posted to overlook the process. Furthermore, agents representing the candidates for monitoring purposes will be allowed at the centres. Marked ballot papers, once sealed in the provided envelopes, will be handed over to the postal service to be delivered to the District Returning Officers. Police, tri-forces, and Election Commission employees who are involved in election duty, will mark their postal votes in their respective District Election Offices in the areas they are posted on 4 and 5 November. Any postal voter who fails to mark their vote will be given an opportunity to mark their vote at their respective District Elections Offices on 8 November. “There will be no exceptions made beyond these five days, and we urge all the postal voters to mark their votes at the respective District Elections Offices or with certifying offices during their designated dates. If you are registered for postal voting, your name will not be included in the regular voters’ registry and you will not qualify to cast your vote on 16 November,” Election Commission Director Channa P. de Silva told The Sunday Morning. The EC further noted that the first postal votes results would be released closer to midnight on the day of the elections (16 November).