The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) on Monday, November 21 suspended three Electoral Registration Officers (ERO) for issuing unauthorised identity cards for election related activities. The suspended officials include K Chandrashekar, ERO for Mahadevapura, VB Bhimashankar, ERO for Chickpete, and Suhail Ahmed, ERO for Shivajinagar, who also served as revenue officers.
“According to the Representation of the People Act, no private organisation or individual is allowed to issue identity cards for election related activities in the election process. In violation of this, it has been found that identity cards have been issued by the ERO to the organisation who have written booth level officer (BLO) on the cards,” said the Mahadevapura suspension order. The Shivajinagar order additionally mentions that the ERO Suhail Ahmed had issued 14 booth level coordinator (BLC) cards.
The suspension orders come at a time when the BBMP is under fire following the publication of TNM’s joint investigation with the Kannada outlet Pratidvani. TNM had revealed that Chilume, a private NGO, had been collecting sensitive voter data through a door-to-door survey. BBMP had given the NGO permission only to carry out election awareness campaigns on revision of electoral rolls ahead of the state Assembly elections. However, TNM discovered that the order was misused and fake ID cards were issued to field workers who identified themselves as BLOs from the BBMP.
TNM spoke to several field workers who were issued fake BLO cards by Chilume who confirmed that they had almost completed the survey in the three constituencies of Mahadevapura, Rajarajeshwari Nagar and Chickpete. The workers said that they were unaware that they were being made to impersonate government officials and thought they were part of a legitimate activity approved by the government. Many of them quit the job over unpaid wages and the horrible working conditions while carrying out the field work.
On November 20, Ravikumar Krishnappa, Chilume’s director, was arrested by the Bengaluru Police. A case had been filed on the proprietors of Chilume on November 17 at the Halasuru Gate Police Station by the BBMP Special Commissioner (Administration) Rangappa S. The complaint accused the NGO of criminal breach of trust, cheating, and forgery. Ravikumar had been absconding for three days after the voter data theft story was published by TNM and Pratidvani.