UDF, BJP contest final voter’s list in Ernakulam

The United Democratic Front (UDF) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have contested the final voters’ list for Ernakulam district, alleging that several anomalies like wrongful bulk inclusion of votes in wards have gone unaddressed despite raising complaints.

According to the tentative final list, the district has 26,35,954 voters compared to 24,92,393 in the draft list. This was after 2,26,598 additions and 88,937 deletions. Further complaints may be raised with the Joint Director of Panchayats, based on which the State Election Commission may give one more opportunity for corrections.

M.G. Aristotle, UDF parliamentary party leader in the Kochi Corporation, alleged that the wrongful bulk entry of voters in different wards had not been rectified and reinstated in the original wards, thanks to anomalies in fixing boundaries of wards during delimitation. He pointed out how 142 voters from his ward were found included in another ward and remained so even after the finalisation of the voters’ list.

“There have also been instances where names were deleted from a ward on the grounds of inclusion in another ward. However, those names were not added in any other ward, thus leaving them without vote. We have identified eight to nine such cases in one booth alone, and in all those cases, the voters were Congress supporters. The extent of the anomaly will have to be examined at the individual booth level, which we are doing now,” said Mr. Aristotle.

K.S. Shaiju, president of the BJP’s city district committee, alleged that no action had been taken on applications for deletions from the voters’ list, and that even the names of the dead and those who had relocated were being retained for the benefit of the ruling CPI(M). He also claimed that the delimitation exercise and the drafting of the list were faulty. “We have come across instances where voters in wards increased by up to 30% due to anomalies in delimitation. We will further raise complaints and then take them before the court,” he said.

However, Election officials denied the unusual spike in voters in wards post-delimitation, claiming that no such instances had come to their notice. The increase was only within the allowed bandwidth, they said.