No foolproof method to avoid errors in electoral rolls: CEO
Mumbai: Problems arising out of deletions in electoral rolls are inevitable as there is no foolproof measure against errors, Chief Electoral Officer Maharashtra Nitin Gadre said here on Monday. “The exercise of deletions was concluded in August 2013 and names of as many as 50 lakh people were deleted. Through lot of publicity, we gave time to people to correct mistakes if any in the voter rolls. “CDs were given to all political parties and the deleted list was published on the website. Details of the proposed deletions were also circulated to political parties. There was no secrecy in the deletions,” Gadre told PTI. He was responding to criticism of incidents where several people from Pune found their names were missing from the voter lists and protests were staged outside the collector’s office. After August 2013, 40 lakh new voters were added in the summary revision. “Another 16 lakh were added after January 31, 2014 including 6.8 lakh after March nine this year. Hence, a total of 56 lakh voters have been added which includes 23 lakh first time voters,” he said. (PTI)
Congress ‘biggest communal party’, says Rajnath
Bhagalpur (Bihar): Countering the divisive and communal barb, BJP on Monday said Congress was the ‘biggest communal party’ because it was responsible for the partition of India and the Bhagalpur riots. “Congress is trying to frighten Muslims in the name of Narendra Modi and calling BJP communal and divisive… but the truth is that Congress is the biggest communal party which facilitated partition of the country,” BJP President Rajnath Singh told an election meeting at Kahalgaon in favour of Shahnawaz Hussain. “Jab Gujarat nahi batah to desh kaise batega (when Gujarat was not divided during the Modi regime how will the country will be divided)?” he asked in the Muslim-dominated Bhagalpur Lok Sabha seat that will go to the polls on April 24. (PTI)
Karnataka govt urges EC to withdraw Model Code
Bangalore: With the single-phase Lok Sabha polls in the state over on April 17, Karnataka Government has written to the Election Commission asking it to withdraw the Model Code of Conduct to enable it to take up developmental programmes. Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister T B Jayachandra said the Chief Secretary has written a letter to the Election Commission to withdraw Model Code of Conduct. “We are expecting a response from the EC soon,” he told reporters here. (PTI)