Aadhaar-voter ID linking: Three Mysuru constituencies lag behind

MYSURU: Linking Aadhaar with Voter ID (voluntary) initiative received a poor response in the urban parts of the district compared to rural areas.
None of the three assembly constituencies located within the Mysuru city limits have crossed halfway mark. Many voters are preferring not to link their Aadhaar number with voter ID cards due to various reasons, including apathy towards democratic institutions.
According to the data, in the Mysuru district among the 25,59,855 eligible voters, 15,98,857 voters linked their Aadhaar with Voter IDs. The total achievement is 62.46%. The highest percentage of linking reported was from the Varuna constituency (78.76%), followed by Periyapatna (77.26%), KR Nagar (75.74%), and Nanjangud (75.15%). The lowest percentage was reported from the Krishnaraja constituency in Mysuru city (39.50%), Chamaraja (42.31%), and Narasimharaja (43.81%).
Even the tribal-dominated HD Kote constituency recorded 70.53% of linking, raising serious questions on why city residents are not showing any interest in linking these two important ID cards.
According to an officer, who wished to be unnamed, it was the city residents who were strongly advocating these two ID cards citing the elimination of bogus cards. “Now, this can be done both online and offline. The process is simple. Still, it is unclear why the residents are not showing any interest in linking these two ID cards,” he said.
According to the city residents, as the linking is not mandatory, many are not showing interest. “The people are fed up with the entire system. They lost confidence in the parties, and political system. So, not many are interested in carrying out this exercise,” said Sanath KJ, a resident from Ramakrishnanagar.