18 September,2014 01:51 AM IST | | Priyankka Deshpande
Many voters who did not find their names on the rolls during the Lok Sabha polls have registered their names once again; however, days before the Assembly polls, they can’t find their names on the website
Pune citizens
After a major gaffe by the district election department prevented lakhs of citizens from voting during the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year, one would assume that the district administration would be careful that a similar fiasco be avoided ahead of the approaching state assembly polls.
Many citizens had angry confrontations with officials when they found their names missing from the voters' list and were not allowed to cast their vote during the Lok Sabha polls earlier this year. File pic
Yet again however, several citizens have come forward with the complaint that they could not find their name on the list of registered voters despite searching on the Election Commission of India's (ECI) website.
During the Lok Sabha elections this year, thousands discovered their names were missing from the voters' list and had taken up the issue with Collector Saurabh Rao. File pic
Deja vu
Keshav Nagar resident, Rahul Singh (name changed) enrolled as a voter for the first time, but was disappointed when he did not find his name on the online voters' list. "I enrolled in June with the hope that I could vote for upcoming assembly elections. However, when I checked the ECI website, I could not find any record of my registration," said Singh who had also registered through the online process before the LS polls but was not included in the voters' list.
"I lost the opportunity to vote during the Lok Sabha elections, and the same thing will happen again with state assembly elections, as yesterday (Wednesday) was the last day for voter registration," Singh added.
It's not just first-time voters who are facing this problem either. Bibvewadi resident, Sumeet Kulkarni (name changed) and his wife have been registered voters since 2004, and they even voted during the LS polls this year. However, even they ran into problems when they searched their names online. "When I checked my name online, I found my first name was wrongly registered, while I didn't find my wife's name at all," Kulkarni told mid-day.
Voters' fault
Officials in the district election department said that all the registered voters' names had been uploaded on the ECI website, except for those who had enrolled in August. The officials said, if voters were unable to find their names online, it was their fault, as they probably didn't know how to search properly.
"It has been noticed that voters do not enter the spellings of their names correctly in the search, and that is why they don't find their names on ECI's website," said Tehsildar Seem Holkar.
She added, however, that the officials had decided to deploy helpers at the ward offices, to assist voters in finding their names on the online list. She also added that they would start a helpline for voters as well. "The 24X7 helpline for voters will also be started in a couple of days, through which voters can get information about their polling centres," said Holkar.
