'Do they form their vote bank through infiltration?': Chhattisgarh DyCM questions opposition over SIR

Raipur (Chhattisgarh) [India], September 30 (HBTV): Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Sharma on Tuesday questioned the opposition’s stand against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in Bihar, asking whether they were creating their ‘vote bank’ through infiltration.

Sharma asked how the names of those now being removed from Bihar’s voter list were originally included. He said the opposition was objecting to the SIR because the Election Commission was separating their alleged vote bank through the exercise. ‘I want to ask them clearly, the people whose names are being removed from the voter list in Bihar, how were they included? Do they form their vote bank through infiltration? And when the work of separating that very vote bank is done through revision of the voter list through SIR, then they oppose it,’ Sharma told ANI.

He further accused the opposition of creating a vote bank in a fraudulent manner. ‘This opposition has a simple meaning – you have created such a vote bank in the voter list in a fraudulent manner and you are opposing its removal. This is their vote bank, to save which they are opposing SIR,’ he said.

On September 15, the Supreme Court declined to modify its September 8 order permitting the use of Aadhaar card as a 12th identity document for inclusion of voters in the revised list being prepared as part of the SIR in Bihar. A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymlaya Bagchi said the order was interim in nature, noting that other identity proofs like ration cards and driving licences are also prone to forgery and Aadhaar cannot be singled out for exclusion.

The Election Commission is conducting the Special Intensive Revision in Bihar ahead of assembly elections scheduled in October and November. The opposition has been criticising the exercise, calling it a conspiracy by the BJP and the Election Commission for election rigging and ‘vote theft’.

(ANI)