Patna, July 24: RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav on Thursday asserted that the party was keeping the “option open” to boycott the upcoming assembly polls in the wake of controversy over the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar.
The leader of the opposition made the remark outside the state assembly on the penultimate day of the monsoon session, responding to queries from reporters.
“We are keeping the option open for boycott of the assembly polls. When the time comes, we will take a decision following a discussion with the alliance partners. What is happening in the name of SIR is nothing short of a fraud,” Yadav said.
“Booth-level officers are putting their own signatures and thumb impressions, on behalf of voters, on enumeration forms. Blank forms are being used like waste paper. Independent journalists who point out these anomalies are getting slapped with FIRs. And the government is okay with all this because the EC is acting like a political tool of the ruling dispensation,” he alleged.
During house-to-house visits in the ongoing SIR of electoral rolls in Bihar, poll officials have so far found that more than 52 lakh voters were not present at their addresses and another 18 lakh have died, according to the Election Commission.
Opposition parties have claimed that the EC exercise will disenfranchise crores of eligible citizens.
The RJD has also moved the Supreme Court against the voter roll revision in Bihar.
Opposition members, who have been turning up at the state assembly for the past couple of days dressed in black as a mark of protest against the SIR, were allowed to make statements by the Speaker on Thursday. A couple of ministers also took part in the discussion.
Yadav expressed anguish that Chief Minister Nitish Kumar “did not utter a word” on the issue, while the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Vijay Kumar Chaudhary “only tried to mix up the annual revision of electoral rolls with the special intensive revision that is taking place now”. (PTI)
