The Hindu : Suspend eviction drives, EC tells States going to polls

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jun 26, 2003

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Suspend eviction drives, EC tells States going to polls

By J. Venkatesan

NEW DELHI June 25. In the interest of free and fair polls and to maintain the fidelity of electoral rolls, the Election Commission has directed Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram to suspend demolition or eviction drives to ensure that voters are not displaced and denied their voting rights.

In identical letters to the Chief Secretaries of these States and the Cabinet Secretary, Union Home Secretary and Secretary, Urban Development, the Commission pointed out that once electors were displaced as a result of a demolition or an eviction drive, the electoral rolls got affected and became defective. And they got relocated in another area outside the Assembly constituency and thus deprived of their right to vote.

The Commission said that any election held on the basis of defective rolls would thus deprive a substantially large number of electors and might give an opportunity to unscrupulous elements to resort to bogus voting in the names of voters shifted out on account of a demolition or eviction drive in a particular area.It said these factors would not only vitiate a free and fair election but might even materially affect the result of the election in the constituency concerned. Hence, demolition or eviction drives should be temporarily suspended and should not be carried out by any Government or civic agencies between now and the completion of the Assembly polls.

Wherever there were any problems in the implementation of the above decision, they might be brought to the notice of the Commission for appropriate directions to ensure due compliance with court orders.

Further in cases of unavoidable dislocation, the Government should place before the Commission all relevant facts, including a suitable rehabilitation plan to enable the Commission to give appropriate orders in regard to corrective steps to be taken by the electoral authorities to ensure that such dislocated electors were not deprived of their voting rights.

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