Elections aren’t a spectator sport, they are lifelines to our democracy. It is our duty as a news organisation to help you make an informed decision through factual reports, ground investigations and hard interviews. Join us in this mission.
The names of more than 7,000 voters are set to be deleted from the electoral roll of Shivajinagar constituency in Bengaluru, as the Karnataka High Court dismissed a writ petition seeking to retain the names. The petition had been filed by Shivajinagar Congress MLA Rizwan Arshad, who had requested that the Election Commission of India (ECI) create a separate list for Absentees, Shifted, and Dead (ASD List).
The issue started in October 2022 when a group of BJP sympathisers raised a complaint claiming there were 26,000 fake voters in the area, and that many had moved out of the area. The complainants provided a list consisting mainly of Muslim names as Shivajinagar is a Muslim dominated area. The ECI had issued notices to approximately 9,000 residents in February, 2023. The notices warned that the names of these voters would be removed from the electoral roll if they failed to appear in front of ECI officials with the necessary documents. Of the 9,000 people, 22 residents approached court questioning the process. However, the court gave relief only to them and told the ECI not to delete their names from the voters list.
MLA Rizwan Arshad and 20 others from the area then approached the court again, but the court said they had no locus standi as it was not proven that they were approaching the court on behalf of the voters. “The petitioners have not pleaded that those persons whose names are sought to be deleted are the class of persons who are unable to seek redressal of their grievance,” court said. It also stated that the petition was not in the public interest or in a representative capacity.
According to Umesh, the Assistant Commissioner for Education and Elections at BBMP, "Since the petition has been rejected, we will proceed with the deletions."
TNM spoke to many Shivajinagar residents who said that they were not aware of any deletions. “We did get a call almost a month ago to confirm if we are still living in the address. And we confirmed. We didn’t receive any notice from the ECI,” said Ziauddin, a resident. Ziauddin has been staying in the same house for several years and voted in 2018. However, this time, the BJP complaint claimed that he had shifted houses. TNM discovered six people, including four from the same household, missing from the ECI's website. These individuals were not even aware that their names had been removed from the electoral list.
From February 2023, around 900 people approached the ECI with their address and relevant documents and will be retained on the list. The remaining thousands of voters will now be eliminated from the electoral list. The Congress has alleged that the BJP targeted Muslim voters, compiled a list and ensured that they were deleted.
An investigation by TNM in November 2022, revealed that a private agency with links to the BJP had been collecting voter data illegally in Chickpet, Mahadevapura and Shivajinagar Assembly constituencies. Following which ECI ordered a revision of electoral rolls in these three constituencies. The final electoral roll for the constituency was published on January 15, 2023, but just eight days later, the BJP demanded the removal of 26,000 names.
Also read: