Names removed from electoral rolls: BJP moves EC, poll panel asks Delhi CEO to verify deletions

The EC’s instructions to the CEO came just hours after the BJP submitted a memorandum urging it to remove names of illegal and temporary migrants and “ghost voters” from the electoral rolls in Delhi. The AAP had also submitted a memorandum Wednesday alleging mass deletion of applications being submitted by BJP workers.

In its instruction to the CEO, the EC said, “The issues raised in representations of both the parties viz to delete illegal/temporary migrants, ghost voters and not to undertake mass deletions of voters without proper enquiry, has to be examined carefully and necessary action taken strictly following the laid down statutory provisions and commission/s guidelines contained in the manual of electoral rolls.”

Former chief minister and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal had, on December 6, claimed that the BJP was trying to have electors deleted from areas that have been AAP strongholds.

On Friday, a delegation led by Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva filed a complaint against “lakhs of illegal infiltrators of Rohingya and Bangladeshi origin”, alongside “duplicate voters”, and “thousands dead persons in the voter lists”. The delegation included Union Minister of State Harsh Malhotra and New Delhi MP Bansuri Swaraj, among others.

Sachdeva urged the EC to run a campaign against illegal enrollment of voters and to run a radio and print media campaign “warning of bogus voters”.

The BJP said in a statement that Swaraj, in her legal submission, presented pages from voter lists that allegedly showed duplicate voters. It alleged that the party’s block level officers were not deleting dead voters despite evidence. “The government of Delhi is creating the false narrative that BJP is objecting to voters of Indian origin in the voter list but the truth is that BJP is objecting to infiltrators and bogus voters,” said Malhotra.