70,000 new voters added in district

Some complain they are not on roll despite having voter card

70,000 new voters added in district

Some complain they are not on roll despite having voter card

Veteran architect Rajanikant Pande and his writer wife Bharati are not sure whether their fundamental right to
vote will be exercised in the forthcoming Khadakwasala assembly bypoll scheduled for October 13.

Rrepresentation pic

They are not the only voters concerned. Although the election branch has added 70,000 new voters in the voters list, the chaos is evident.

"We are still not sure whether we can vote in the coming municipal election or not. We have been given the voters card and our names are still not in the official list prepared by the election department," said Bharati.

"During the last state assembly elections in Pune, we couldn't cast our votes and were derived of our basic right to vote."

Add to this, the voluminous work of verifying genuine voters and adding new voters is still ongoing. Hence, new voters and old alike from Khadakwasala constituency may not be able cast their valuable vote in the next elections.

Apurva Wankhede, Deputy District Election Officer, said that the updated list with the pictures, telephone numbers should be ready by January 5, 2012. "The branch is currently separating duplicate, dead and shifted voters in all the 21 assembly constituencies in the Pune region."

Earlier, the election branch had declared 65,47,706 total voters in Pune district on January 12, 2011. The provisional 70,000 voters may rise to 66,17,706 voters.

"There is a possibility of some new addition of voters in the process of suggestions and objections," said Wankhede. "In addition, we are also pursuing those voters who had been given voters card but could not able to vote as their names were not found in the voters list," she assured.

Ajinkya Joshi, 19, a college student residing at Sinhagad Road, whose name has been enrolled in the new voters list, is also not sure if he can vote in the Khadakwasala by-elections. "It's the same with my sister, Juili (22), she will be casting her first vote in coming elections and is unsure," he said.

Sharad Naik, Tehsildar, Pune, from the election branch, however, refuted the charges said that now we have a proper computerised list and no errors will be evident, as we are using the latest Electoral Roll Management System (EMRS) software prescribed by the Election Commission of India.

Meanwhile, Ravindra Pathare, Block Level Officer (BLO), Election Branch, Pune, working for the Khadakwasala state assembly constituency said that we have dropped the idea of including new names in voters list for the Khadakwasala by-elections.

"We are just upgrading the present 3.5 lakh of old voters list. The newly added voters may get a chance to vote in the coming PMC poll," he said.

Voters in district
*u00a0Male voters: 34,39,150u00a0
* Female voters: 31,08,556