Warrant against teacher in Ahmedabad after she fails to join election duty

Prajapati received an order from the collector’s office to join as a booth-level officer (BLO) in the Ghatlodiya area of the city. She declined the duty, citing personal reasons. When the police reached the school to detain her on Monday afternoon, she called her husband, Avinash, who is also a municipal teacher at Gandhinagar Municipal School Nava Vadaj in Ahmedabad.

“We had already replied to the two notices that were issued from the Mamlatdar office on the next day itself. We have requested for exemption citing the Election Commission rules that a female teacher can be deployed on election duty only if necessary. But the request was declined stating that the BLO duty cannot be exempted… being Lok Sabha elections,” Avinash told The Indian Express.

The first notice was issued on February 1 and the second on February 19. Hinalben has also cited personal reasons that her in-laws are old and her two daughters are very young so she would not be able to join the BLO duty assigned for the Ghatlodiya area.

In reply to the second notice, she requested to change the duty area from Ghatlodiya to Gota near her home. This too was declined, the family said. “We were taken to the regional revenue office in Gota from where the warrant was issued by the police where we submitted the same request which was accepted too. If that was the case then what was the point of police taking a female teacher from her school in front of her students,” Avinash questioned.

Ghatlodiya Mamlatdar R S Patel said, “She has accepted her BLO work. She has been given the Gota area only which she had demanded. We had issued her notices twice to which she replied but later she did not attend the meeting or replied to repeated phone calls from the office.” He said this is not the first time such an order has been issued.