After the transfer of Hyderabad District Election Officer Somesh Kumar and causing anxious moments to the Chief Election Officer Bhanwar Lal, the issue of large-scale deletion of voters in the city is likely to embarrass the Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao.
Former Minister M. Sashidhar Reddy, who took up the issue effectively with the Election Commission (EC) that led to an inquiry team being rushed to Hyderabad told The Hindu that he is determined to take it to the logical end. He said: “It was the Chief Minister who summoned the CEO to an official meeting at his camp office on July 21, where he fixed the target of deleting 15 lakh voters in the name of Aadhaar seeding or describing them bogus. I am going to pursue with the Election Commission to take action against him as he has violated rules that insulated officials deputed for election duties”.
Impact on politics Mr. Reddy, also former vice-chairperson of National Disaster Management Authority, quoted Section 13CC of the Representation of People’s Act that specifies that “the Chief Electoral Officers and District Election Officers…. are deemed to be on deputation to the Election Commission for the period during which they are so employed and such officers and staff shall, during that period, be subject to the control, superintendence and discipline of the Election Commission”. This being the case he wondered how Mr. Rao could summon and give directions to the CEO.
In his latest representation to the EC backed with documents and media reports including CDs, Mr. Reddy says Mr. Rao had insisted (at the meeting) on deletion of bogus voters en masse from electoral rolls as their continuance would impact State politics altogether. Twenty-four of the 119 Assembly constituencies were in Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) limits and all these bogus voters were here. If Aadhaar seeding with Electors Photo Identity Cards was done properly, these voters could be removed from the list, Mr. Rao had emphasised.
Mr. Rao went on to remind the officials that voters should be 66 per cent of the overall population as per EC norms but in the case of 24 Assembly constituencies in GHMC area this percentage was more indicating presence of bogus votes. All this showed that the Chief Minister has transcended his powers and strayed into those of the EC, Mr. Reddy contends. Is he the official of the EC to review the progress of the seeding and the revision of electoral rolls?, he asked. The deletion of voters on such a massive scale was unprecedented and was done selectively with an intention to boost the prospects of ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti in the coming GHMC elections, he alleged. Mr. Reddy said the meeting and what the Chief Minister said there was unwittingly confirmed by Mr. Bhanwar Lal in his interviews with TV channels. “The Chief Minister personally called me at exactly 2.22 p.m. on that day (July 21) saying Chief Secretary and GHMC commissioner are with him to discuss Aadhaar seeding with EPIC and that he wanted to know why the seeding was poor in Hyderabad while it was cent percent in Nizamabad and 80 to 90 per cent in other districts,” he told the interviewer.
Mr. Bhanwar Lal who did not respond to repeated calls from The Hindu , in his interviews to TV channels found nothing wrong in meeting the Chief Minister as it was during non-election time. He admits that after the Chief Minister’s instructions, Aadhaar linking was launched and continued till the Supreme Court stopped it.
“By the time SC judgment came nine lakh duplicate voters were identified when only 45 per cent of EPIC-Aadhaar seeding was complete. If the seeding was 100 percent it would have been possible to delete all duplicate voters,” the CEO said. It was a clear indication that the CEO would have reached the target of 15 lakhs given by the Chief Minister, Mr. Reddy argues. And since the Aadhaar seeding had to be stopped voters were deleted on a large scale, he claims. Citing precedents where action was initiated, Mr. Reddy said the EC directed the UP State government to suspend senior officers including the District Election Officer of Moradabad and others in the case of illegal deletion of 15,800 names of voters in Thakurdwara assembly constituency, a segment of Rampur LS constituency.
