Absentee voting allows people to vote before the actual election day. To be counted, absentee ballots must be received by the county election commission by the close of polls on election day; absentee ballots cannot be hand delivered. Elections in India involve immense political mobilization and organizational complexity due to the scale - in the 1996 Lok Sabha election, over 59 crore people voted, over 1,000 candidates ran from recognized parties, and nearly 40 lakh people were employed to run the election at a direct cost of over Rs. 5,000 crore.