Karnataka Congress to approach EC over ‘selective’ deletion of voter names ahead of polls

Of the 9,195 voters, 22 had filed a writ petition in the High Court maintaining that their names could not be deleted suo motu. “SEC has filed a memo in the court saying the 22 names will not be deleted from the voter list. If they have submitted this in the High Court, why were notices issued in the first place? As per ECI guidelines, names cannot be deleted voluntarily six months prior to elections. Yet, why were notices issued to voters due to pressure from BJP?” he asked.

While the court has offered relief to the 22 voters, he questioned whether the remaining 9,000 voters had to approach the court to protect their rights. Arshad said that removing names just two months before elections would set a bad precedent and “hinder the process of conducting fair elections in the future”.

The MLA alleged that there was a disparity in the names of voters displayed by the SEC and the list of voters submitted to the political parties.

Responding to queries, chairman of Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee’s communication and social media wing Priyank Kharge alleged that 6,000 voter names were deleted in Aland constituency. Referring to the Shivajinagar case, he said that the initial SEC list recommended the deletion of 26,000 voters in the constituency. “How did they get the list? Why were the owners (of Chilume) not investigated by the government?” he asked.

The party will file a complaint with the ECI over deletion of voter names, Kharge added.