The Gujarat Congress has alleged that the State Election Commission (SEC) deleted large number of names from the voter list at the instance of the Bharatiya Janata Party government, which is facing a challenge to retain its hold in the local bodies.
In Ahmedabad alone, 1.03 lakh names were deleted from the electorate list. The voters, whose names were deleted from the records, learnt about the deletion when they went for voting for the civic polls on Sunday.
“Why names on such large scale were removed from the list is something the SEC and the State government must explain to the people because the eligible voters could not exercise their franchise,” said Congress leader and Sonia Gandhi’s political secretary Ahmed Patel, who is campaigning for the party in Gujarat, his native State.
Cong.’s demandOn Tuesday, a Congress delegation called on the SEC demanding that no names be deleted from the list for the panchayats polls scheduled for November 29.
“As per our assessment, close to 2.5 lakh names were deleted in six cities where the municipal election was held on Sunday. This is a criminal act by the SEC at the behest of the government,” said Congress general secretary Nishit Vyas, who submitted a memorandum to the Commission.
Blames it on ECIHowever, the SEC has blamed the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the voters for the removal and added that the electoral rolls were prepared based on the rolls prepared by the ECI for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
“It is true that more than one lakh names were removed from the list in Ahmedabad but the SEC had no role in either addition or deletion of any name in the rolls because those were prepared by the ECI,” said State Election Commissioner Varesh Sinha.
