400 await voting right for 10 yrs

Rachna Khaira

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, December 14

Over 400 people living in Sarup Nagar and Kanpur Abaadi on the Jalandhar–Pathankot highway have been denied voting rights for the last 10 years. They figure neither on the voters’ list of the Municipal Corporation (MC) of Jalandhar nor the gram panchayats.

According to Honorary Captain Jaspal Singh (retd), an area resident, the issue, despite being highlighted a number of times before the district administration and political leaders for years, remains unaddressed.

Residents says both mohallas were part of Raowali village before 2007. The area had over 820 votes at that time. Later in that year, over 466 votes in Sarup Nagar and Punjabi area were shifted to the MC.

“We last voted in the MC elections in 2007. Later in 2012, we were told that we cannot vote as our area has been included in the gram panchayat. However, our names were missing from the gram panchayat voter list also during the elections in 2014,” said Singh.

Even in the MC polls slated for December 17, they don’t figure on the voter list. Interestingly, according to the new delimitation plan, the areas, including Sarup Nagar and Punjabi Bagh, fall under the newly-constituted ward numbers 4 and 5 while the Kanpur Abaadi area falls under ward number 3.

“We approached candidates contesting from our area and also former MLA Sarwan Singh Phillaur. Shockingly, we were told to get at least 500 votes made from the area to get ourselves listed in the voters list,” he said.

Another area resident, Sirfaraz Singh Dhesi, who runs a school, says owing to the confusion, the area has been getting grants neither from the MC nor from the gram panchayat since 1995. “The colony has been named after my father Sarup Singh. Despite paying house tax and property tax and even getting building plans approved form the MC, we are not provided any civic amenities by the MC,” he said.

The area cries for proper roads, water and sewerage connection. It doesn’t have even a single street light. The colony which came into existence in 1995 has over 90 to 100 houses with a population of over 400 people.

“The area residents of nearby Mohallas have begun to mock at us by calling us Pakistani residents as we do not have voting rights in our country,” said another area resident, Shankar Kumar Chaudhary.

When contacted, area MLA Chaudhary Surinder was found to be clueless over the issue. “I had gone to the area only once during the Assembly elections. I am not aware of the issue,” said Chaudhary Surinder.

More shockingly, Additional Deputy Commissioner-cum-Additional Chief Electoral Officer, Jalandhar, Bhupinder Pal Singh too is ignorant about it. “I need to check the facts from the concerned returning officer of the area,” he said.

Why confusion occurred?

The major reason behind the confusion is that the voters’ list of the ongoing MC elections is not made available in the public domain. The district administrations were asked to hand over the lists to the district units of all the political parties with a task to further distribute the voting slips to the area residents.

However, no one checked if the voter slips were distributed. While the political leaders were busy in the canvassing and playing over the party hoppers game, the voters are running from pillar to post to get their voters slips from the area candidates.

Voting may plunge

With the utter chaos reported in the distribution of the voters slip, the MC elections this year are expected to report a considerable plunge in the voting percentage this year as many of the mohallas are reportedly left out from the voters list published by the district administration.