Raising the issue of inclusion of photo identity cards in West Bengal through illegal affidavits, a delegation of Left parties met Chief Election Commissioner S.Y. Qureshi, urging him to cancel them.
A delegation of the four Left parties led by Sitaram Yechury of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) submitted a memorandum stating that the attention of the State Chief Election Officer was drawn last month regarding inclusion of fictitious names in the voter's list.
The delegation said that because of the delay and large-scale mistakes in printing photo identity cards, some interested quarters were flouting the Election Commission's rules by attaching affidavit in Form 6 for the inclusion of fictitious names in the voter's list.
The memorandum said that despite assurances from the Chief Electoral Officer, some block officers were accepting forms in “large-scale violation” of rules of the ECI. West Bengal had also drawn attention to the difficulties faced by the people in the hill areas of Darjeeling, flood-affected areas in three districts and those evicted from East Midnapur, Khajuri, Nandigram, and Moogbaria and urged him to ensure that their names were enrolled.
“The CEO is fully aware of these issues and assured the delegation that necessary instructions will be sent and steps would be urgently taken. But there was no instruction from the Chief Electoral Officer with regards to affidavits. In the meantime, thousands of fictitious and illegal affidavits are being prepared and people from outside are being forcibly deposited in the office of electoral officers who are unfortunately resorting to mass-scale acceptance of those illegal affidavits,” the memorandum said.
