18 Lakh Muslims are missing from voters’ list: NGO
Bengaluru: The names of about 18 lakh Muslim voters are either missing from the recently updated voters' list or they don't have voter ID cards issued in their name for the Karnataka Assembly election 2018, according to a New Delhi-based NGO.
The Centre for Research and Debates in Development Policy (CRDDP), headed by Dr Abusaleh Shariff, renowned economist and member of the Justice Sachar Committee, has now begun a campaign to rectify this.
According to a Deccan Herald report Khalid Saifullah, Research Associate and COO of CRDDP, told that they have identified 16 Karnataka constituencies from which the names of 1.28 lakh voters are missing from the list. Based on the number, they are estimating that around 15 lakh would be missing from the 224 Karnataka constituencies.
Saifullah said “As per the 2011 census data, the Shivajinagar constituency has 4.3% of single households among the total 18,453 Muslim households. But we found that more than 8,900 households have only one registered voter in their house, which is around 40 percent of the total Muslim households,” he said.
The organisation then developed a website -- missingmuslimvoters.com -- and an Android app –- Muslim Voters -- to organise and educate people. “Everything is volunteering,” said Saifullah about the campaign. They are asking the people of Karnataka to register with their app to help the missing voters to enrol. “People think that once the election dates are announced, they cannot enroll, which is wrong.
They can do it till the last date of nomination. The Election Commission on Tuesday announced the election dates and the last date of nomination is set for April 24.
Once people register as volunteers in the app, they will receive details of missing voters in the neighbourhood whom they can help to enroll. The data is also available on their website. “More than 8,000 people downloaded the app since its launch on March 13,” said Saifullah.
According to a video released on Saifullah's YouTube channel, Asif Pasha, a volunteer from Shivajinagar helped 500 people to enroll.
Pasha, a Civil Defence Warden, told DH that the missing names could be due to various reasons. “One is that the Election Commission shuffles the data or deletes it mistakenly in the process of compilation. During the shuffle, the names of one family land up in different polling booths. So it virtually makes them unable to find their names on the list,” said Pasha.Another reason, according to Pasha, is that when the Booth Level Officer reaches out to voters, they will write the respective columns as E - expired, S - shifted/Change of Residence, Q - Disqualification or R – repeated. This is primarily because of a communication gap, said Pasha.
“We found at least 2,000 inaccurate entries. In Shivajinagar constituency, we collected 700 applications from people with election IDs who are unable to find their names on the list. We are helping them and we hope they will appear on the supplementary list that EC would publish before the elections,” said Pasha.
“We met Minister Roshan Baig as soon as we found this,” said Saifullah. In a video reaction posted on Saifullah’s YouTube channel, Baig said: “Our team of workers at the ground level went house to house and conducted a random survey and found that the voters' app, which is supplied to us is accurate and I must thank the CRDDP group for giving this information to us.”
When contacted for a reaction, Congress MLA Rizwan Ashraf said that the situation is concerning and has to be rectified. He ruled out the possibility of a unified Muslim community action against enrolment. “Who doesn’t want to see their names on the list? The ID cards are being used as an identity for many other purposes. Whether you vote or not is another issue,” said Ashraf.
Missing names of voters are not a new phenomenon in Karnataka. During the BBMP elections of 2010 and 2015 and the General Elections of 2014, many complaints were registered about missing names.
In an April 2014 report on ID card deliveries, one of the BLOs said that there were many instances where they went to hand over cards to citizens but had to return as the homes were locked.
In 2015, MLA SR Vishwanath had said that 7,000 to 8,000 names were missing from the Dasarahalli constituency list and the names of over 50 percent of the voters were missing in the additional voters' list for Yelahanka constituency.
Back in 2009, the Congress protested over “deleting” voters “especially those belonging to the Muslim community” in Hubballi, according to this report. That same year, the Congress and the JD(S) attacked the BJP over 14,000 missing names in Tumkur. "Mischief mongers had targeted names of minority communities, including Muslims and Christians," according to these two political parties.
Earlier this year, the Congress had asked its workers to keep an eye on any large-scale deletion of names in the voters' rolls in the run-up to the Assembly election. "We have to be cautious while fighting the formidable enemy (BJP) who is known for manipulation," said Manick Tagore, AICC secretary in charge of Karnataka (Belagavi division). "A large number of names were deleted in many constituencies in the recently held Gujarat Assembly election. Most of these names were of either Muslims or Dalits, who are the Congress supporters. We have reliable information that the BJP is responsible for this."
(A DH report)
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US SC rejects 26/11 attack accused Tahawwur Rana’s plea seeking stay on his extradition to India
New York, Apr 7 (PTI): The US Supreme Court has rejected 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Rana's appeal seeking a stay on his extradition to India, moving him closer to being handed over to Indian authorities to face justice.
Rana, 64, a Canadian national of Pakistani origin, is currently lodged at a metropolitan detention centre in Los Angeles.
He is known to be associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 attacks. Headley conducted a recce of Mumbai before the attacks by posing as an employee of Rana’s immigration consultancy.
Rana had submitted an ‘Emergency Application For Stay Pending Litigation of Petition For Writ of Habeas Corpus' on February 27, 2025, with Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and Circuit Justice for the Ninth Circuit Elena Kagan.
Kagan had denied the application earlier last month.
Rana had then renewed his ‘Emergency Application for Stay Pending Litigation of Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus previously addressed to Justice Kagan’, and requested that the renewed application be directed to US Chief Justice John Roberts.
An order on the Supreme Court website noted that Rana's renewed application had been “distributed for Conference” on April 4 and the “application” has been “referred to the Court.”
A notice on the Supreme Court website Monday said that “Application denied by the Court.”
Rana was convicted in the US of one count of conspiracy to provide material support to the terrorist plot in Denmark and one count of providing material support to Pakistan-based terrorist organisation Lashker-e-Taiba which was responsible for the attacks in Mumbai.
New York-based Indian-American attorney Ravi Batra had told PTI that Rana had made his application to the Supreme Court to prevent extradition, which Justice Kagan denied on March 6. The application was then submitted before Roberts, “who has shared it with the Court to conference so as to harness the entire Court’s view.”
The Supreme Court justices are Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Elena Kagan, Associate Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, Associate Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
In his emergency application, Rana had sought a stay of his extradition and surrender to India pending litigation (including exhaustion of all appeals) on the merits of his February 13.
In that petition, Rana argued that his extradition to India violates US law and the UN Convention Against Torture "because there are substantial grounds for believing that, if extradited to India, the petitioner will be in danger of being subjected to torture."
"The likelihood of torture in this case is even higher though as petitioner faces acute risk as a Muslim of Pakistani origin charged in the Mumbai attacks,” the application said.
The application also said that his “severe medical conditions” render extradition to Indian detention facilities a “de facto" death sentence in this case.
The US Supreme Court denied Rana's petition for a writ of certiorari relating to his original habeas petition on January 21. The application notes that on that same day, newly-confirmed Secretary of State Marco Rubio had met with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.
When Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Washington on February 12 to meet with Trump, Rana’s counsel received a letter from the Department of State, stating that “on February 11, 2025, the Secretary of State decided to authorise” Rana’s "surrender to India,” pursuant to the “Extradition Treaty between the United States and India”.
Rana’s Counsel requested from the State Department the complete administrative record on which Secretary Rubio based his decision to authorize Rana’s surrender to India.
The Counsel also requested immediate information of any commitment the United States has obtained from India with respect to Rana’s treatment. “The government declined to provide any information in response to these requests,” the application said.
It added that given Rana’s underlying health conditions and the State Department’s findings regarding the treatment of prisoners, it is very likely “Rana will not survive long enough to be tried in India".
During a joint press conference with Prime Minister Modi in the White House in February, President Donald Trump announced that his administration has approved the extradition of "very evil" Rana, wanted by Indian law enforcement agencies for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, "to face justice in India”.
A total of 166 people, including six Americans, were killed in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks in which 10 Pakistani terrorists laid a more than 60-hour siege, attacking and killing people at iconic and vital locations in Mumbai.
