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Jabalpur: CEO sends probe report on Vivek Tankha complaint to EC

BHOPAL: Noted lawyer and Congress candidate from Jabalpur Lok Sabha constituency Vivek Tankha , who had raked up the issue of irregularities in voting by military personnel during the first round of polling in Jabalpur constituency of MP on April 29, in his complaint alleged due that ‘due process was not adopted’ while enrolling about 3,500 military personnel in voters list.




After Tankha’s complaint, Election Commission had sent a team to Jabalpur to probe the allegations. On Saturday, the probe report was sent to the EC by office of the chief electoral officer of the state VL Kantha Rao.

In his complaint, Tankha had alleged, “In 2019 names of 2,212 people were included in the electoral rolls of the Cantt-99 Vidhan Sabha area of Jabalpur Lok Sabha constituency. These people were not in the voters list prepared for the assembly election held in November 2018. Later, number of such voters increased to 3,500,” Tankha had alleged.

He alleged, that “these names were suddenly included in the revised electoral roll issued on 22-02-2019.” An objection was raised on the basis that “all these names included in the various poll booth their residential address was shown as House No. 0 or 00”, Tankha alleged in his complaint.

He further pointed out in the complaint, “In the instant case neither any certification of deletion of name from the electoral roll of the earlier constituency was produced nor the physical verification of the address proof in which the person whose name was added was done by the BLO. Thus, a complete go by was given to the due process of law in adding the names of such persons. That, it would be not out of place to mention here that the returning officer of 13-Jabalpur loksabha Constituency i.e. Collector Jabalpur was of the opinion that if the person (Military personnel) has even stayed for a single night in the station then he can be added in any electoral roll as voter. Residence is not a requirement. Strange argument of Collector/District Returning office of Jabalpur.”

Following the complaint, the EC had sought a report from office of the chief electoral officer by May 5. A team including joint chief electoral officer Sandeep Yadav and deputy chief electoral officer, Rajesh Shrivastav were sent to Jabalpur for a probe into the allegations.

“We had sent our report to the EC,” chief electoral officer, VL Kantha Rao told TOI.

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