BANGALORE: BJP leader C T Ravi has received a notice from the Election Commission for making an ‘inflammatory’ speech during an election rally at Sakleshpur in Hassan district on April 6.
The Election Commission directed him to a furnish a reply by 6 pm on Wednesday.
According to M N Vidyashankar, State Chief Electoral Officer, Ravi has been booked under sections 153(A) and (B) and 505 of IPC and also under sub-clause 11 and 13 of clause I and III of Model Code for promoting enmity against different communities.
Separate cases have also been booked against D K Shivakumar, state Congress working president and senior Congress leader Margaret Alva for staying beyond the stipulated time of 5 pm on Tuesday at Madikere and Shimoga respectively.
Meanwhile, a total of 1921 cases were booked across the state till 3 pm on Wednesday for violations of the model code in the state.
The total value of cash, liquor and goods seized was Rs 27.14 crore, of which Rs 20.14 crore was in cash.
Party-wise 201 cases were booked against BJP, 193 against Congress, 98 cases against JD(S), 14 against BSP and 4 cases against the CPM.
In all, 141 cases were booked against the independents.
A total of 5,674 micro observers and 2,795 video and digital cameras were keeping an eye on the candidates in the second phase of polls in Karnataka.
The CEO has appealed to the public to take the help of booth-level officers in case of confusion over names missing from the voter’s list.
“We have provided the voter’s lists wherein names are entered in alphabetical order.
People are requested to check their names with both boothlevel officers and presiding officers,” he added.
Vidyashankar has appealed to political parties to make available the updated voter lists to their activists deployed at the booths. The CEO clarified that in all places, including naxal-infested areas, voting would take place from 7 am to 5 pm.
Regarding complaints of voters names missing from the lists, Special Officer R Manoj clarified that after the notification of final list on February 10, around 65,000 names were deleted under form number 7 all over the State.
During the same period around 10 lakh names were added. In case of four parliamentary constituencies in Bangalore, out of 79 lakh total voters, only 1903 names were deleted.