Renowned lyricist Gulzar was not alone in not being able to cast his vote for the BMC elections on Thursday, with many a commoner unable to locate their names in the voting list or alongside wrong or missing addresses.
Among them was Chembur resident Lakshmi Shankaran, who had successfully voted in the assembly polls. “Though I voted in the assembly elections, somehow my name went missing in the BMC elections,” said a visibly disappointed Shankaran of ward number 149 (Tilak Nagar-Chheda Nagar). While alleging that voters from slums, unlike those from buildings, had their names and addresses listed correctly, Shankaran rued, “It seems they (politicians) don’t want our votes.” Seconding her, another resident Pankaj Mehta complained of “a lot of discrepancies” keeping even the habitual voter, who had voted in several polls, out of the BMC poll process.
What’s worse was election commission officials, including returning officers (RO), being clueless about sorting the issue or offering any help. In fact, RO of Shankaran’s ward, UM Gurakhe, ruled out any solution for the oft-repeated malady on the polling day. “The list used for the 2009 assembly polls was updated for the BMC polls,” said Gurakhe, while reiterating that only those listed as of Wednesday were allowed to vote.
There were issues with the no-vote form as well, with an India Against Corruption volunteer, Piyush Bhatia, of ward number 18 in Kandivali (E), failing to submit one due to the unavailability of the form at the polling station. “The returning officer said there was no such form made available by the poll commission,” Bhatia said.
A senior EC official who did not wish to be named said the discrepancies could have crept in during the updating of the list post-2009 assembly polls. “But the onus of checking if their names are on the list lies also with the voter before the polling is scheduled,” the official added.
About the no-vote option, he clarified that although anyone wishing not to vote for an official is asked to fill up a model voting form, wherein his/ her signatures are taken for sake of proof, there is no ‘no-vote’ option per say in the EVM provided by the EC.
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