‘Give time to remedy ASDD, uncollectible elector forms’

Civil society engaged in Special Intensive Revision (SIR) volunteer work sought a 15-day ‘buffer period’ to electors categorised as ASDD and ‘uncollectable’ to seek remedies before the Draft Electoral Roll is published. Activists have sought an online option for applicants for their names on the list and requested authorities to reschedule the draft Roll publication which is slated for August 17 by a fortnight.

In a letter to the ECI and the Telangana Chief Electoral Officer, civil society organisations Adalah and Aseem have also sought strict adherence to the prescribed procedure before deletion of existing electors. They also asked for a mechanism to restore the names of voters wrongly omitted or deleted during the SIR, and preservation of their previous electoral records.

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“It is grossly unfair if a person who has voted in previous elections is wrongly deleted from the electoral rolls. More unfair to the person would be to ask him or her to register as a new voter,” Adalah office bearer M.A. Mujeeb told The Hindu.

The organisations have additionally asked for a clarity on remedies available, including the appellate process. They have further sought that Form 6 should not be used as a substitute for the deletion, appeal and restoration procedures applicable to existing electors, and called on structured consultation with civil society organisations and other grassroots stakeholders.

With the SIR enumeration phase ending on August 10 and with over 73 lakh described as ‘uncollectible’, activists noted that Booth Level Officers not being able to collect enumeration forms was not sufficient grounds to establish that an elector had either moved permanently, or was dead. It was possible that the elector was temporarily unavailable or the BLO could not locate the person. As is the case with many voters who are tenants.

, another possibility was that the voter had moved within the same locality.