Ahmedabad

Following an aggressive representation by Gujarat Congress leaders and strong protest by holding an urgent press conference by them, the district collector of Ahmedabad in his response just before an hour and half before the end of polling, issued a circular that voters who were by mistake marked as ‘deleted’ using red stamp in voters list would be allowed to cast their vote if name is mentioned in voters list and not in delete list.

District Collector of Ahmedabad issued a circular and asked immediate implementation of this order which had been conveyed to all presiding officers through zonal officer staff or other arrangement.

State Congress president Bharatsinh Solanki expressed satisfaction over this prompt action taken by district collector in response to Congress delegation’s complain.

Solanki said that this was a rare occasion when voters list given to party candidates and voters list in polling station both were different. Solanki said if voters are not able to cast vote because for their presence in delete list, then it’s understandable situation, but here the voters who were in voters list and not in delete list were stamped with ‘delete’ mark and they were denied their voting rights. Therefore Congress took this issue in hand.

BJP on the other side said that while the issue was valid, the Congress party wrongly linked it to ruling BJP.

Shri IK Jadeja, senior leader and spokesperson of Gujarat BJP said, preparing voters lists is State Election Commission’s domain, and BJP is not in picture in this issue. Jadeja said its own politically strong areas also suffered same problem. Jadeja said, BJP is concerned about right of voters, but linking election commission related issue to particular group and party was improper on opposition’s part.

– DeshGujarat