Row over minors names on voting list

Interestingly, her age too is mentioned as 17 in the official list of voters. However, the age of rest of the students mentioned in the list was found to be between 18 and 19. A complaint to this effect was sent to the SDM, A. S. Sahi, who is monitoring the poll-related activities in the area by the villagers.The school head-mistress, Rajinder Kaur, has also confirmed that these students are minor. In a list of the 10 students supplied by her, Rajinder Kaur has mentioned their exact dates of birth. Apart from Baldev Kaur, others named in the list are Charanjit Singh, Naresh Kumar, Chaman Kumar, Sunil Kumar, Manoj Kumar, Amarjit Singh, Raman Kumar, Ravi Kumr and Harminder Singh. On being contacted, Rajinder Kaur said the list was prepared following allegation of bogus votes in the area. SDM A. S. Sahi, when contacted, said, 8220;In all, we have detected about 60 invalid votes which include those of minors. These have now been cancelled.8221;

He further said that an inquiry had already been entrusted to the block development officer of the area to fix accountability for this error.

District Congress Committee general secretary Jagjit Singh Jagga is apprehensive of 8220;partisan8221; approach of the administration, which, he said, was acting at the behest of the ruling party.

To substantiate his claim, Jagga presented before this correspondent two separate lists of voters of Chairman and Dugri villages, in which the names of 10 voters figured at both the places.