EC takes stock of ration cards

Manas R Bannerjee in Malda

Jan.12. — The Election Commission observer for Malda district, Mr D Singh, visited the district food and supplies department office today and sought a detailed report about the system and procedure of issuing fresh ration cards. There has been complaints that people who have come here recently have got ration card made without checking electoral photo identity cards. The observer asked the district officials the procedure adopted to identify applicants as Indian citizens before issuing ration cards. The departmental officials assured him that they would submit their report in a day. Mr Singh today held a meeting with all block development officers and urged them to clarify the reasons for abnormally low ratio of voters to the total population of this district. According to the Malda district magistrate, the block development officers told the EC observer that a huge number of migrated workers in this district can not enroll their names because they work in various states during the electoral roll revision. On the other hand , the additional district magistrate, Mr BP Barat, said: “In many blocks, the birth rate is too high and the number of minor family members are abnormally higher than the number of genuine voters”. The number of minor population is higher than the number of people eligible for casting vote, Mr Barat added. After interacting with all the BDOs , Mr Singh suggested them to conduct a special campaign during the festivals such as Id and Durgapuja in such places where the percentage is low when the migrated labourers returned to home district for festival. Sources said that many migrated labourers come here before election and cast their votes by local arrangement and showing certificate of local authorities. It was also found from the English Bazaar block that some migrated workers have collected duplicate EPIC for their identification and other needs at their workplaces so that the other state officials can not identify them as Bangladeshi. The Malda district magistrate, Mr Abhijit Choudhuri, proposed a new system to enroll all migrated labourers issuing ‘form-VI’ to the migrated labourers who are working across the country through post office and requested the observer to inform the EC for its execution. “The post office will send their ‘form-VI’ to the district and on receiving the form filled in by the labourers, the district election department will enroll their names in the electoral rolls”, Mr Choudhuri said. The observer has also sought the list of areas where the EPICs have been distributed only to 70 to 80 percent voters. He also suggested them to launch a special derive in these areas where the EPIC is still not distributed to 20 to 30 percent of the voters. Mr D Singh today also visited the erosion-hit areas where the displaced people face problems in getting EPIC or to enroll their names in the voters’ list. After receiving the complaints from the people of booth No. 79 at erosion-hit Panchanandapur in Kaliachak II where voters’ number is 926. There were several complaints about problems in enrollment of displaced people after destruction of original land. The observer also visited the camp of displaced people to check out discrepancies in enrollment and problem in receiving EPIC. He also heard the problems of displaced people from Bengal who are at present living in char lands under the control of Jharkhand and do not have voting rights in Bengal. In 1999 and 2000, many people had voting rights in both the states. Malda administration deleted their names based on their present address in Jharkhand.

[ Statesman News Service ]

EC observer hears views on revision of rolls .

Published on 12 Jan 2006.