Confusion prevailed at various polling verification centres in the city on Monday, with the deadline for submission of electoral roll revision closing.
Many people seeking transfer to a different constituency/ward were not aware of the procedure and spent the day running from one verification centre to another. Some were even unaware until Monday that it was the last day for submission of applications.
Veena Kaiker, a senior citizen and resident of Millers’ Road, said she had been to three different centres since morning in an effort to get her name registered. “I have been living in the same locality for 25 years. I don’t know why my name went missing and I was unable to vote last time. This time, I wanted to ensure that I can vote. I got to know this morning through newspapers that today was the last day. I initially went to two other centres, before they directed me to the correct one on Nandidurga Road.”
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Ms. Kaiker was not alone in this. Several residents had trouble locating the centre tagged to their addresses.
Ramdas, another senior citizen, had to get his constituency changed from Jayanagar to Shivajinagar and he rushed to get it done within the day. “Identifying the municipal office was a problem. I initially approached the BBMP office in Shivajinagar, where they directed me to go to Jayanagar and get signatures from there. I have spent the day travelling between Jayanagar and Shivajinagar,” he said, adding that while all other procedures went smoothly for him, he wished there was comprehensive information available for locating the correct verification centre.
While a majority of the people were dependent on the hard copies of forms available at the verification centres, some opted for filling the forms at home by downloading it from the website. However, there too, some of them were in for a shock. “We downloaded the form just yesterday and filled it at home. Today, when I came to the BBMP office to submit it, I was told that it was an outdated form. I had to refill everything from scratch,” said V. Kumar, another voter.
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Tough time
On the other hand, BBMP officials and booth-level officers have been having a tough time managing a huge number of applications in a short span of time. “We cannot upload the application details during working hours as there are several people visiting us to either collect or submit applications. We have been filling details online at night. Half of the information has been uploaded and the rest needs to be done. If the server works efficiently, we aim to upload 100 applications a day,” an officer in Shivajinagar said.
They were working towards issuing voter IDs by January 25, marked as National Voters’ Day.
15 lakh applications received
About 15 lakh applications have been received across the State for the electoral roll revision, which ended on Monday.
The last date had been extended after the Election Commission officials, who were on a visit to the State, intervened. Chief Electoral Officer Sanjiv Kumar said that about 15 lakh applications had been received, and they will be reviewed by February 12 before the draft rolls will be announced again.
Sources said that with the last date for application coming to an end, the Electoral Roll Officers and Assistant Electoral Roll Officers will now review the claims by February 12. “The applications range from additions to deletions, change of address within the constituency or migration to a different constituency, among others. All these claims will be reviewed before the electoral roll is released,” an official said.
Meanwhile, Mr. Kumar held a video-conferencing on Monday with district officials to assess the progress across the State.
Improvement in electoral roll sought
The BJP, on Monday, submitted a petition to the office of the Chief Electoral Officer seeking improvement in the electoral roll when the new one is published.
The petition said that the draft roll, which was given to them, had errors. They included names without address, duplication of names, several names without photographs, which is mandatory, and dead persons figuring in the list. BJP representatives said that these problems are being faced across the State. The problem of adding Bangladeshi immigrants in the voters’ roll continues to persist, they said.