Timely suo motu action prevents bogus voter registration in Maha's Rajpura Assembly seat

Chandrapur (Maharashtra), Sep 19 (IANS) The office of the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) in Maharashtra's Chandrapur district has clarified on Friday that because of the prompt due diligence and action taken by the state administration, attempts of bogus voter registration in Rajura Assembly constituency from the district were successfully prevented.

"During the period from October 1 to 17, 2024, a total of 7,592 applications for new voter registration were received. On detailed verification conducted through booth level officers, serious discrepancies were observed. Out of these, 6,861 applications were found invalid due to reasons such as applicants not residing at the given address, applicants being non-existent, or absence of proper photographs and supporting documents. Accordingly, these applications were rejected in due course, and no entry was made in the electoral roll," the office of the Chandrapur Electoral Registration Officer said in a statement.

The statement said, "Taking serious note of the matter, the District Election Officer instructed the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) and Rajura Sub-Divisional Officer to conduct a thorough inquiry into all applications and to initiate necessary criminal proceedings under the provisions of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and the Information Technology Act, 2000."

Consequently, an FIR has been registered at the Rajura police station and further investigation is being carried out by the police department, the statement added.

"The ERO office has reiterated that due to timely vigilance, 6,861 bogus applications were rejected and thus prevented from entering the electoral roll of the 70-Rajura Assembly constituency. Action was taken Suo Motu without any complaint," it said.

The statement by office of the Electoral Registration Officer comes in the wake of Leader of Opposition (LoP) Rahul Gandhi's allegation with regard to voter list irregularities in Rajura Assembly constituency.

Rahul Gandhi alleged that 6,850 "fake online additions" were made in Rajura Assembly constituency from Chandrapur district.

Rajura is one of the six Assembly seats in the Chandrapur Lok Sabha constituency.

Congress candidate Pratibha Dhanorkar won the Chandrapur seat by 2,60,000 votes, and in the Rajura Assembly seat alone, the Congress' lead was 58,349 votes.

However, in the Maharashtra Assembly polls held just six months later, BJP's Deorao Bhongle defeated Congress nominee Subhash Dhote by 3,054 votes.

Dhote said he would have won the elections by more than 3,000 votes for the third time.

"When I lodged a formal complaint with the Election Commission (EC) about the fraudulent entries, they deleted all of them," he said.

"The tehsildar also filed an FIR in the case. However, the EC is not sharing the details of those involved in the scam with the police," he added.

--IANS

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