E-Paper
Bihar electoral roll revision: Rahul, Tejashwi lead protest amid bandh call
Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) workers and supporters took to the streets and tried to enforce the bandh through the closure of shops and business establishments
Opposition Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) leaders Rahul Gandhi and Tejashwi Yadav on Wednesday led a procession to Patna’s election commission office against the special intensive revision of the electoral roll in poll-bound Bihar amid a bandh call and state-wide protests. The revision has sparked disenfranchisement concerns.
Police tried to stop the procession from moving towards Mangles Road, where the office is located, even as hundreds of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) workers and supporters took to the streets and sought to enforce the bandh through the closure of shops and business establishments.
RJD and Communist Party of India (Marxist) workers burnt tyres and blocked roads in Patna’s Maner. Trains, including Shramjeevi Express and Bibhuti Express, were among those stopped across the state.
Processions against the electoral roll revision were also taken out in other places in Bihar, with protesters carrying banners shouting slogans against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and the Election Commission of India (ECI).
At Darbhanga, RJD workers and supporters protested bare-chested and blocked the roads by burning tyres. The national highway (NH)-22 between Muzaffarpur and Hajipur was blocked with the help of buffaloes in Vaishali. At Nawada, supporters of the INDIA bloc disrupted vehicular traffic on NH-20 at Rajauli near the Jharkhand border. Lawmaker Amarjit Kushwaha-led RJD and Communist Party of India workers, who blocked Siwan’s JP Chowk. Business establishments, educational and financial institutions, remained closed.
Protests were also reported from Jehanabad, Ara, Araria, Supaul, Saharsa, Katihar, and Kishanganj amid heavy deployment of police forces at important places.
Additional director general (law and order) Pankaj Darad said all preventive measures were taken to maintain law and order during the bandh. “There were no major untoward incidents.”
Opposition parties have questioned the delay in announcing the revision months before the polls are due. They have argued it could have been undertaken earlier. ECI has, over the last decade, accepted Aadhaar and the ration card for inclusion in the electoral roll. One needs a birth certificate and documents of the father and mother for the revision. The Opposition parties have said those without such documents, particularly backward communities, will find themselves deprived of their right to vote and will have to run around.
On June 24, the ECI announced the revision, emphasising the need to clean the electoral roll due to rapid urbanisation, frequent migration, increasing numbers of first-time voters, non-reporting of deaths, and the inclusion of names of undocumented foreigners.
The ECI has said an electoral roll revision was last held in Bihar in 2003, which covered nearly 50 million people. It has underlined that it has a constitutional obligation to ensure that only citizens are on it. The ECI instructed the electoral registration officers to treat the 2003 electoral roll as “probative evidence of eligibility, including presumption of citizenship unless they receive any other input otherwise.”
The Supreme Court will on Thursday take up petitions challenging the revision. The petitioners have raised concerns about the manner and timing of the ECI in undertaking the exercise, giving 30 days for voters to provide proof of their citizenship based on a set of 11 documents, which do not include readily available ones such as Aadhaar, ECI photo identity card, or ration card.
