Congress leader Pawan Kheda on Sunday claimed that 89 lakh complaints lodged by the party’s booth level agents (BLA) during the special intensive revision (SIR) of the voter list in Bihar were rejected by the Election Commission. He alleged that ignoring such a large number of disturbances raises questions on the intention of the Election Commission.
What are the allegations of Pawan Kheda?
Kheda held a press conference in Patna and said that the Congress team gave complaints of 89 lakh irregularities to the Election Commission, but the Commission did not accept them. He said, “When our BLA went to file complaints, he was told that complaints would not be accepted by political parties, only personal complaints will be taken.”
The Congress leader alleged that it is clear from this attitude of the Commission that the entire process of SIR cannot be trusted. He demanded that the entire special revision should be done again and all the removed names should be investigated from house to house.
Claimed to cut the names of more than 70 percent women?
Kheda claimed that during this period the names of 65 lakh voters have been removed from the voter list. Out of these, the names of 25 lakh people were removed due to migration, on the basis of declaring 22 lakh dead and about 9.7 lakh names were found to be absent. He said that the names of women at many booths have been unevenly removed. Giving examples, he said that there are 7,613 booths where more than 70 percent of women’s names were cut.
Apart from this, Kheda also alleged that two EPIC numbers have been issued to many voters. He said, “We have its receipts, which cannot be denied. So it is necessary that the Election Commission checks these figures and correct the mistakes.”
On the other hand, Bihar’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) office completely rejected the allegations of the Congress. The office said that till now any authorized BLA of the Congress has neither added any claim or complaint for objection (Form-6) nor the removal of the name (Form-7).
The CEO office said that the current voter list is only a draft and a final list will be made only after the process of claims and objections. It was also said that in rural areas like Bihar, the same name, father’s name and age are common in rural areas, so only data mining cannot be proved duplicate.
The office made it clear that duplicate names are only identified with ECI’s software Eronet 2.0, but they are removed only after field verification.
Overall, the claims of Congress and Election Commission have created a big controversy over Bihar’s voter list. Now it has to be seen what steps the Commission takes in this matter further.
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