Postal ballots: Probe reveals malpractices

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: State intelligence chief T K Vinod Kumar has submitted a report to state police chief Loknath Behera that has vindicated some malpractices regarding processing of postal ballots of the police officials who were on election duty.
Top police sources confirmed that the report has said that the voice recording that appeared in one of the social media groups of the police asking the police officials on election duty to hand over their ballot papers to police association leaders for casting their votes is genuine. The report has also learned to have recommended a detailed probe to find out whether officials have handed over their ballot papers to the association leader for casting their votes.
It has also been recommended that the four officials giving the same address to deliver their postal votes needs to be probed, as it does not seem to be a legitimate action on their part. The postal ballots are applied by police officials who are posted on election duty outside their home constituencies.
While 1,200 police officials were posted for election duty outside the state, as many as 4,000 police officials were posted for duty outside their constituency.
Sources said that even among them, all the police officials need not apply for the postal ballots. The allegations arose after one of the voice messages in a police association WhatsApp group asked all officials to hand over the ballot papers to the association leaders for voting. On the basis of the allegations, Behera has ordered state intelligence chief Vinod Kumar to probe the allegations and submit the report at the earliest. Sources said that the report will be handed over to chief electoral officer Teeka Ram Meena.
Meanwhile, KPCC president Mullappally Ramachandan said that chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan's silence on the matter was laughable. He said that the chief minister's silence, when a group of police officials tried to sabotage the democratic election process, was suspicious. He demanded that those who tried to sabotage the election process should be removed from the service and criminal cases should be registered against them.