Lok Sabha polls | About 1 lakh names removed from the voters list in Coimbatore, alleges Annamalai

Tamil Nadu BJP president alleges mass deletion of names from Coimbatore voting list, raising questions about Election Commission's preparedness.

Names of almost one lakh voters were missing from the voting list in Coimbatore, alleged K. Annamalai, Tamil Nadu BJP president, and the party’s candidate for the Coimbatore constituency.

Listing a few such instances, Mr. Annamalai told presspersons late on Friday, April 19, 2024, the day of the polls, that nearly 850 names were missing at the Angappa School polling station and about 200 names were missing at a polling station at Theppakulam.

“We do not know under what logic the names were removed. This also raises questions about the pre-poll preparedness of the Election Commission. This is a planned and mass-scale deletion of names,” he said.

If the husband had his name in one polling station, the wife’s name was in another station, Mr. Annamalai alleged. The name of a person who was dead was on the list, while his wife’s name was missing -- there were several such cases, he said, adding that in Palladam, basic amenities were also not made available at a polling station.

The BJP had documented all of this and given the details to the Returning Officer and the Observer. It also sought a repoll in these places. “We also suspect that there was political interference [in the deletion of names],” he said.

According to Kranthi Kumar Pati, Returning Officer for the Coimbatore Parliamentary Constituency, changes take place in the electoral rolls in the summary, alongside continuous revisions. At every step, from draft to final, the rolls are shared with political parties. There was no representation from the parties at those meetings. If there is any specific instance of voter deletion, “we can look into it,” he said.