Karnataka - Bangalore   

CEC springs a surprise on people

Staff Reporter

`Vote India' campaign for political reforms kicks off in Rajajinagar During the visit, Mr. Krishnamurthy found that the names of all the four residents of house number 108 figured in the list. But three names of the people in house number 102 were missing.

EXAMINING THE LIST: The Chief Election Commissioner, T.S. Krishnamurthy (second from right), who launched the `Vote India' campaign for political reforms, checking whether the names of the residents of a house are in the voters' list, in Bangalore on Friday. — Photo: K. Gopinathan

BANGALORE: The residents of house numbers 102 and 108 on the 20th `A' Main Road in Rajajinagar 1st block had a surprise visitor on Friday morning.

None other than the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), T. S. Krishnamurthy, visited the houses to check for himself if the names of the residents have been included in the voters' list.

By doing so, Mr. Krishnamurthy, actually kick-started the `Vote India' campaign for political reforms.

The campaign, coordinated by Janaagraha and Citizens' Initiative on Voters' Identification List (CIVIL) in Bangalore, aims at minimising the errors in the electoral rolls and facilitating greater citizens participation in elections.

During the visit, Mr. Krishnamurthy found that the names of all the four residents of house number 108 figured in the list. But three names of the people in house number 102 were missing. He directed the Chief Electoral Officer of Karnataka, Abhijit Das Gupta, to carry out the corrections as per the rules.

Nagpur ward

This is exactly what the volunteers of Janaagraha and CIVIL will do in the next 10 days in Nagpur ward in Rajajinagar Assembly constituency. These volunteers, supervised by the community leaders and the jurisdictional Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BMP) Revenue Officer, will verify the voters' list on a pilot basis in this ward.

"Based on the learning from this ward, we will take up the entire Rajajinagar constituency comprising 12 wards (three lakh voters). The local community leaders will anchor the entire verification process and submit the corrections to the Election Commission of India," Janaagraha campaign coordinator, Ramesh Ramanathan, said.

Verification

He said this campaign, which is a build-up to a series of electoral reforms, would be launched in partnership civil society movements all over India. "Nagpur has 29 polling booths. Two volunteers will verify the names of voters' in each polling booth and forward it to the community leader, who will coordinate with a central control room for compiling the database. This exercise will go on for 10 days in the ward and the final data will be submitted to the Election Commission for their verification," he said.

Vote India national coordinator, Jayaprakash Narayan, who represents the Loksatta in Hyderabad, said: "the recent political developments in Goa, Jharkhand and Bihar could probably have been avoided if there was a proportionate representation system of elections." He wanted voters to become part of the governance and "gear up to solve problems in the system and not be problems themselves.''

The Rajajinagar MLA, N.L. Narendra Babu, suggested that a law be enacted to make voting mandatory in the country.

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