Muslim villagers claim they boycotted second phase voting over Kheda public flogging incident
poll officials deny
Kheda, Dec 5: As many as 1,400 Muslim voters from Undhela village in Gujarat's Kheda district on Monday boycotted voting during the second phase of Assembly polls in protest against the public flogging of some men from the community by police two months ago, community leaders said.
Poll officials have denied the claim saying there was no boycott call.
Community leaders said all 1,400 Muslim voters of the total 3,700 voters in the village, situated in Matar taluka, joined the protest and didn't exercise their franchise when votes were cast across 93 Assembly seats in the second phase.
"All Muslim voters from the village stayed away from the voting process as a mark of protest against the public flogging and the administration's refusal to punish the guilty. We gave a boycott call to express our anger at the one-sided action by the police. Till now, no policemen have been suspended for their misdeed," Maqbul Saiyad, a local Muslim leader from Undhela, claimed.
However, Kheda district collector KL Bachani cited local poll officials and said there was no boycott call.
"As per the Returning Officer's report, no such incident has taken place and no one has approached us with any such issues. As per our record, 43 per cent of voters did turn up in Undhela to vote today," said Bachani.
Seven persons, including a policeman, were injured when stones were thrown at a Garba event in Kheda district in October by a group allegedly comprising members of the Muslim community. They had objected to holding the event near a mosque.
Later, videos showing policemen in plain clothes beating some men, suspected to have thrown stones, with sticks in front of other villagers went viral on social media, causing an uproar.
The counting of votes for all 182 Assembly constituencies in Gujarat- which went to polls in two phases on December 1 and 5- will be taken up on December 8.
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Ensure uninterrupted CCTV coverage of strongrooms: DMK to EC, after outage at Ooty
Chennai, Apr 29: Tamil Nadu's ruling DMK on Monday urged the Election Commission to ensure uninterrupted CCTV coverage of all strongrooms in the state and sought declaration of premises of storage of EVMs a "no-fly zone" for drones.
DMK Organisation Secretary R S Bharathi, in a memorandum, urged the poll panel to "ensure the CCTV coverage in all the strongrooms where EVMs are stored is not interrupted for whatsoever reasons including technical, electrical, electronical, among others."
Referring to the Closed Circuit Television cameras at the Government Polytechnic College in Udagamandalam (Ooty) going blank for 20 minutes (6.20 pm to 6.40 pm) on April 27, Bharathi requested uninterrupted coverage in his representation addressed to the Chief Election Commissioner and the Chief Electoral Officer of Tamil Nadu.
The DMK leader requested the authorities to declare the campuses that house EVMs in strongrooms as "no-fly zone" for drones.
The EVMs of Nilgiris Lok Sabha constituency are stored in strongrooms on the Ooty polytechnic college premises.
Bharathi said the only way to monitor the secure state of strongrooms is through uninterrupted CCTV coverage, and urged that a backup of recorded video be preserved.
