GHMC not giving info on voter deletions: RTI activist

HYDERABAD:  Adding fuel to the controversy that about 22 lakh voters were deleted during the seeding of Aadhar and voter ID cards in 2015, GHMC election wing has refused to divulge the copy of files pertaining to a certain pilot project raising alleged questions on the transparency followed during the exercise, an RTI activist has alleged. 

Srinivas Kodali, the RTI petitioner, a city-based independent data researcher, said reply an RTI query about irregular deletion of voters was not provided by the GHMC. Even the copies of notices sent by the GHMC election wing in 2015 under the RPA  1950 were also not provided, he said. 

 “The EC should disclose the names of the 22 lakh voters that were deleted during the pilot project instead of blaming the voters for not checking their names in the electoral rolls,” Srinivas said.

In the reply dated February 7, 2019, the joint commissioner of elections, GHMC said, “As per the direction of the SC, the EC has suspended the NERPA programme and the database is disabled in 2015.

Hence no information can be supplied as the programme has been suspended,”  he said. Meanwhile, the RTI applicant said that he would now write a letter to the CEO.