Late Tuesday night, the Karnataka chief electoral officer Sanjiv Kumar called for a press briefing to clear the air on the voter id haul. The election commission found voter ids stashed in boxes at a flat in Rajarajeshwari Nagar in Bengaluru, including 9,746 voter cards and roughly a hundred thousand ‘counterfoils’ that looked like acknowledgement slips that are usually issued while adding names to the electoral roll. The flat, allegedly belongs to Manjula Nanjamari, who has openly declared herself a BJP supporter to ANI.
Wednesday saw both Congress and BJP rush to the press to make accusations against each other in this situation. Both parties have blamed the other for trying to rig the election. BJP approached the poll panel in New Delhi on Wednesday, and sought voting in the particular constituency to be countermanded. The electoral commission has decided to ait for a special observer report before acting on such a request.
Contrary to earlier statements, the electoral commission has clarified that the voter ids are not fake. “Verification suggests the ID cards are genuine but the significance of counterfoils can only be verified after investigation,” Kumar had said during the press briefing.
The Congress believes BJP is behind this as the flat belongs to Nanjamari who was once a BJP corporator, and it had been rented out to a man who had fought civic polls in 2015 on a BJP ticket. While BJP on the other hand, is claiming that this is Congress’ doing, but have not provided any concrete proof yet.
Congress Leader Anand Sharma met election officials in New Delhi on Wednesday; he said the discovery of voter cards was staged by the BJP since the flat had not been raided by the poll watchdog.
