IPT 2.2 | April 2023 | Section 7
The state of Karnataka, with an incumbent BJP government, is scheduled for elections in mid 2023. The state’s Election Commission issued notices to over 9000 voters in the Shivaji Nagar constituency in Bengaluru, based on a complaint by the BJP alleging fake voters. The Congress MLA from the constituency has written to the state’s Chief Electoral Officer saying that nearly 8000 votes of the selected 9195 belong to Muslim and Christian communities, and that the exercise has been initiated selectively. A delegation on behalf of Archdiocese of Bangalore has also submitted a memorandum to the Chief Electoral Officer alleging that about 8000 missing names include voters from the Scheduled Caste, backward classes and Muslim communities. The complaint by the BJP was filed in October 2022, and received a further push in January 2023 once the Election Commission released a final list of voters. An investigation also revealed how a private agency with links to BJP had collected voter data illegally to form the basis of BJP’s complaint.
Image: By Own work based on User:Furfur – Derivative of File:Wahlkreise zur Vidhan Sabha von Karnataka.svg, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=121403634