BHUBANESWAR: Resentment is brewing among voters in the State Capital over the alleged discrepancy in draft voters list prepared by the office of additional district magistrate and the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) for the urban local body (ULB) elections.
A total of 7,27,456 eligible voters have been identified in all 67 wards of the Capital city based on the electoral roll issued by the Election Commission with January 1 as the qualifying date.
However, citizens as well as former corporators including a few from the ruling BJD, alleged that the voters’ names of one ward have figured in another ward at many places in all three zones of the Capital.
Names of a number of voters from Ward 64 figure in Wards 65, 66 and other nearby wards, alleged a former corporator on the condition of anonymity. He said that Ward 29 which had around 12,000 voters in the previous urban polls, now has 9,000 voters.
Locals and former public representatives have also expressed shock over the presence of only 1,784 voters in Ward 33. The ward earlier had around 8,000 voters.
The discrepancy in voter segregation will cause a lot of inconvenience for the voters in the future, said members of Opposition political parties. They asked how a voter from a particular ward will raise grievances related to the locality if his/her name figures in the voters list of another ward.
Besides, people expressed displeasure over the short period notified for filing objections and claims which may have an impact on the voters turnout in the civic polls. Voters in BMC jurisdiction have been given six days to file their claims and objections. The deadline for the same is February 16.
“One has to find his/her name in the voters list and then raise claims with the ADM office to swap a name from the voters list of one ward to another. The process takes time for which a period of six days is insufficient,” admitted another former corporator.
Bhubaneswar ADM Prafulla Swain, however, said that the timeline has been fixed by the State Election Commission. So far around 30 grievances related to ‘name in the list of other wards’ have been received. Around 12 officers have been deployed in the field to help people whose names are missing from the voters list of the ward they live in.
Besides, he said that another ward-wise voters list will be published on February 19 prior to publication of the final list on February 24 to allow voters raise further queries if necessary.