Karnataka - Bangalore   

Making your displeasure with candidates known

— Photos: V. Sreenivasa Murthy and Sampath Kumar G.P.

Vignettes: Ballot papers made way for electronic voting machines long ago. But whoever pasted this sign outside a booth in K.R. Puram constituency is still living in the past. A ramp at a polling booth in Basavanagudi constituency was of great help to disabled and elderly voters; Chandramma making her way to vote at a booth in Hoskote. A floral welcome for voters at National College, Basavanagudi.

Bangalore: What do you do when you believe none of the candidates in your constituency deserves your vote?

You need not cast an invalid vote but can declare you are not voting in anyone’s favour because none is worthy of it. Section 49-0 of The Conduct of Election Rules, 1961 says that an elector can declare so to the presiding officer of the booth and this will be entered in Form No. 17-A.

This little-known provision was exercised by a few in this election, with V.S. Shridhara and Parvatheesh B., voters from Bangalore South constituency, among them.

In fact, the presiding officers were unaware of this provision but relented after being lectured to on the provision.

Teachers deputed on poll duty looked particularly tired, and with good reason. The so-called vacation meant only more work for them this year. “First it was exams and then evaluation work. That was followed by training for polling duty. And here we are now,” said a polling officer, a high school teacher in Tumkur. “We will be going back only to get on with admission work.” He said he gets no more than Rs. 750 for polling work.

People who went to cast their votes at National College, Basavanagudi (Chickpet constituency), were in for a pleasant surprise. The helpdesk set up by Congress candidate R.V. Devaraj wore a corporate look with two beautiful flower arrangements at the two ends of the table. Besides, two posh signs, which said “Welcome” and “Enquiry”, drew the attention of voters.

For the past few days it was the candidates who were sweating it out to reach out to the voters. But when a reporter went to a polling booth at Nagendra Block in Basavanagudi constituency to cast his vote at 7 a.m., he found that several people who had lined up at the booth were sweating profusely.

It emerged that many of them had come directly from their workout at the gym and the nearby park.

A group of about 40 to 50 women from the economically weaker section were stranded near a polling booth in Cox Town for nearly two hours after casting their votes.

These women had reached the polling booths on the St. Aloysius’s College premises in vehicles organised by various political parties, around 3.30 p.m. However, they were found waiting outside the college at 5.30 p.m. for the same vehicles to drop them back home. “They told us to wait for their vehicles,” said Sagayarani, a resident of Kandaswamy Garden.

The indelible ink, which used to be a dot on the index finger, is a long line this time, running from the nail well past the cuticle. “So even this is modelled after the naama of Chief Election Commissioner N. Gopalaswami,” deadpanned a voter surveying the inch-long proof of voting. The initially perplexed polling officers then cracked up. “We have been strictly instructed to do it this way,” they explained, once they had caught their breath.

Some polling booths in Bangalore had residents venting their ire against polling officers because they were declared “dead” on the electoral rolls. This was noticed in Pulakeshinagar constituency and Gandhinagar constituency.

Scores of Tamil-speaking residents gave vent to their ire in Pulakeshinagar as they found that their names were missing from the voters list. Several women were told that their names had been struck off as they were declared dead when the tsunami struck India some years ago.

Incoherent with rage and barely able to contain his disappointment, Vivekanandan, a resident of Jayamahal, said he had been a resident of Standage Road near Moore Market for more than three decades.

“My father, Shekar, died three years ago. The names of all my relatives who stay with me are on the list except for my name,” he said.

“I even went to the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike office and filed a declaration saying that I am alive. Yet, when I came to booth number 125-A near Moore Market in Pulekashinagar to cast my vote, I was sent away by the officials,” Mr. Vivekanandan said.

A similar situation led to some tension in Okalipuram. Angry residents showed sheet after sheet of names being scored out on the list and marked “deceased”. Murugesh, a resident for 40 years who was declared dead on the list said, “There are hundreds of us waiting outside, while there are so few inside to vote.”

(With inputs from K.V. Subramanya, K.N. Venkatasubba Rao, Bageshree S., Krishnaprasad, Deepa Ganesh and B.S. Ramesh)

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