BJP blames EC for low turnout in Hyderabad
HYDERABAD: Blaming the Election Commission for the low percentage of voting in Hyderabad city, BJP Telangana unit chief G Kishan Reddy has alleged that due to the mismanagement of the commission a large number of electors were not able to exercise their franchise and demanded a high-level probe into the missing of names of hundreds of eligible voters from electoral rolls.
Speaking with reporter here, Kishan Reddy said that as the EC was not able to provide voter slips to all eligible voters, a large number of them, especially first-time voters and youth, could not exercise their franchise.
'Though freshly-enrolled voters received voter identity cards, their names were missing from the rolls. Similarly, a large number of regular voters were shocked to discover that the roll did not have their names. All these factors contributed to poor polling in the city, he explained.
Reddy alleged that EC officials were not able to distribute even 30 percent of the polling slips in the city.
'Earlier, political parties used to distribute polling slips to the voters and the maximum number of voters received the slips. But this time, parties were not allowed to do so and the work was handed over to GHMC officials who miserably failed in their mission.'
Non-functioning of EVMs in several booths in the city delayed polling forcing the people to wait for long and making some to leave the booths for home without casting their votes.
'In my Amberpet Assembly constituency, EVMs did not function in some booths till afternoon, resulting in many voters going back without casting their votes.'
About 800 voters in Amberpet were allotted to a booth at faraway Vidyanagar and not a single voter cast his or her vote in that particular booth, he said and added that had the Election Commission taken enough care, the voting percentage would have been much higher as most of the voters, especially youth and women, were very keen to vote in elections this time.
News Posted: 1 May, 2014
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