Chalavadi challenges Congress over ‘vote theft’ claims

CH NEWS, BENGALURU

Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council Chalavadi Narayanaswamy has challenged the Congress over its allegations of “vote theft”, asking whether similar irregularities could have occurred in Karnataka and Kerala, where the party is in power. Reacting to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s letter to the Election Commission seeking cancellation of elections held after the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) and demanding ballot-paper voting, Narayanaswamy said the demands should have a logical basis. Narayanaswamy defended the SIR exercise, saying it was being conducted according to the Constitution. He said similar revision exercises had taken place when the Congress was in power and claimed there was no reason to oppose the process now. On the Congress’ proposed complaint to the Election Commission, he alleged that the party was opposing SIR through a “toolkit”. He maintained that SIR had no connection with either the BJP or Congress. He said Form 7 applications should be used to remove names of deceased persons, duplicate entries and ineligible voters from electoral rolls. He alleged that the Congress wanted such names to remain on the lists, including those of Bangladeshi residents, deceased persons and people holding voter IDs at two locations. “People do not vote for thieves”, Narayanaswamy said, accusing the Congress of making allegations without evidence. He claimed that no names had so far been deleted through Form 7, despite allegations that large numbers of voters had been removed. He also questioned the claim regarding deletion of 5,000-6,000 voter names in Babaleshwar, saying the figure would translate into only a few allegedly ineligible voters per polling booth. He challenged Congress leaders to produce documentary evidence supporting their allegations and said the BJP would protest if its workers were targeted.