E-Paper
EC to reverify names deleted from Andhra Pradesh roll
Chief electoral officer (CEO) Mukesh Kumar Meena said instructions have been issued to check if due procedure was followed while making deletions in the voters’ list from January 6, 2022 till date
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has ordered re-verification of all names deleted from the electoral rolls of Andhra Pradesh since January 6 last year, amid allegations from opposition parties of large-scale omission of their supporters from the voters’ list.
In a statement on Thursday, chief electoral officer (CEO) Mukesh Kumar Meena said instructions have been issued to all district election officers (DEOs) and district collectors to check if due procedure was followed while making deletions in the voters’ list from January 6, 2022 till date.
“The DEOs and collectors have directed electoral registration officers (EROs) in their jurisdiction to obtain the physical files related to all the deletions under various categories and get them cross-verified to ascertain whether proper documents are maintained or not and whether procedure prescribed by the ECI has been followed in such deletions or not,” Meena said.
Booth-level officers should conduct 100% field verification of such deletions, he said, adding EROs should also do random field verification for at least 1,000 such deletions.
“The DEOs were also directed to appoint a senior officer of the district as Special Officer to get verification of at least 500 such deletions in each assembly constituency as a second-level check and that the collector/DEO himself will field verify at least 100 deletions in each constituency in a random manner,” he added.
The entire exercise should be completed by August 30 this year and a report be sent to the ECI, the CEO said.
Welcoming the direction, senior Telugu Desam Party (TDP) lawmaker Payyavula Keshav said ECI has finally responded to the complaints of the opposition party. “It is a victory for our long-drawn struggle,” he told reporters.
The MLA also alleged that ruling YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) leaders, with the support of village volunteers and state officials, were pressuring booth-level officers to omit a large number of names, who they thought were not favourable to the ruling party, from the voters’ list.
He pointed out that if a person applied for more than five deletions, the ERO concerned should personally verify them. If there were any applications for bulk deletion of votes, a three-member committee should be formed to verify such deletions, the TDP leader added.
“They should serve a notice on such an applicant and summon him for verification. Only after being satisfied with his claims, should they take up deletion of voters,” he said.
Last week, the CEO had ordered suspension of two government officials who were found to have allegedly indulged in deletion of voters from the electoral roll in Uravakonda assembly constituency represented by Keshav.
Based on the directions of the ECI, the state government suspended Shobha Swaroopa Rani and Bhaskar Reddy, who worked as chief executive officers of the Anantapuramu Zilla Parishad in 2020 and 2021, respectively, and also worked as electoral registration officers (EROs) in Uravakonda.
Besides, two booth-level officers (BLOs) were also suspended for alleged irregularities in the same constituency.
Kesav alleged that at least 10,000 names were deleted from the voters’ list between 2020 and 2021 without following due procedure, on the pretext that either they were dead or had shifted their residences or were duplicate voters.
Meena, however, said a detailed inquiry by the poll authorities revealed that only 111 cases of deletion were not genuine.
The ruling YSRCP, meanwhile, accused Keshav of “misleading” poll authorities. “The YSRCP has not influenced any poll officials for deletion of voters. Only duplicate entries were deleted. How can the TDP say all of them were their party sympathisers?” senior YSRCP leader from Uravakonda, Y Pranay Reddy, said.
TDP president and former chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu in a letter to the ECI recently had alleged that names of at least one million voters, believed to be TDP sympathisers, across the state were deleted with the help of volunteers who accompanied BLOs.
TDP spokesperson P Ashok Babu said Naidu would leave for New Delhi on August 28 to meet the chief election commissioner and produce all evidence in the matter.
