Time to hold EC,officials accountable?

Hyderabad: Is it high time to question and hold the State Election Authorities and the staff working on behalf of the election commission engaged in the revision of electoral rolls?

The reason is that the state election authorities recently held a video conference with the district collectors to review and give instructions to kickstart the special electoral rolls revision from August 20. The issue assumes significance as the revision of electoral rolls is being taken ahead of elections for the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) scheduled next year.

Earlier, a hue and cry was raised alleging that illegal Rohingyas and Bangladeshis have been enlisted into the voter lists of 150 wards of the GHMC. On the other, the Chief Electoral Officer of Telangana, the state-level authority, functions on behalf of the Election Commission of India (ECI) and is dependent on the GHMC staff in the preparation of the election.

Scores of complaints have been sent and representations submitted to the election authorities at the district, State and Central levels for the past several years. However, so far, neither the Central Election Commission authorities nor the state or district election authorities have come out and announced the action taken against the erring officials for gross irregularities that have taken place in the electoral rolls.

It may be mentioned here that the State BJP had earlier complained to the ECI officials in Delhi, demanding to remove 25,000 fake votes enlisted during the Munugodu by-poll.

Similarly, sitting MP and former MLA Eatala Rajender was accused of manipulations in the electoral rolls by the Karimnagar district election administration, complaining that 34 voters were registered by giving the residence address of the Huzurabad chairman. Similarly, 41 more voters were registered with the house address of another leader.

In the latest of the barrage of complaints against collateral negligence shown in the preparation of electoral rolls, Union Minister of Coal and Mines and Secunderabad MP G Kishan Reddy demanded complete revamping and verification of the voter lists. He charged that the votes of dead persons were not deleted from the voter lists. However, thousands of votes have been deleted in the Jubilee Hills Assembly segment. "The electoral rolls with thousands of deleted voters were handed over to the party at the eleventh hour by the election authorities. Votes of the members from the same family with the same door numbers were found in different polling booths located a distance apart during the parliament elections,” he alleged.

Besides, people have taken to social media to give a complete dressing down by scoffing at the GHMC and its staff, accusing them of deliberately deleting 3,000 votes during the parliament elections. For example, "100 out of 951 votes at St Mary's School polling station in Vijayanagar Colony under the Nampally Assembly segment were deleted."

The GHMC, the nodal agency that prepares the electoral rolls and conducts elections to the State Assembly and Lok Sabha, has come under sharp criticism not once or twice but in multiple elections and for several years, deleting votes in gross violation of the norms.

Voters in the Shaikpet division staged a protest during the last parliament elections. However, when people were trying to reach them, "GHMC and the Revenue Divisional Officer went into hiding and did not answer during the parliment elections," the voters accused.

The voters expressed their anguish by asking the election commission, GHMC Commissioner and District Collectors, instead of lecturing on the importance of voting, to focus more on how the people's right to vote has been trampled upon in broad daylight. The voters have raised valid questions, asking the GHMC how many people it had served notices before deleting their voters. It's for years since such questions were raised, but neither the GHMC nor the CEO of Telangana has ever responded to them.

Besides the allegations of illegal delegation of votes in Shaikpet, Jubilee Hills, a voter from the Professors Colony of the Malakpet Assembly segment had taken to social media by giving full details of his house number, voter identification numbers and how they were staying in the area for the past 45 years. However, out of several voters of his family, 15 to 16 votes were deleted in the polling booth number in the newly published special summary revision of the voters list of April 25, 2024. As if this embarrassment was not enough, several bonus votes were included in the list with his house number.