THERE has been a vigorous debate on criminalization of politics and illegitimate use of excessive and unaccounted money power in elections. Several sensible and practical suggestions have been offered. The Election Commission, the Law Commission, and various committees have studied these issues. There is no dearth of solutions. But all efforts at reform have been stymied for want of parliamentary action. Further tightening of Section 8 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 to prevent persons with criminal record and questionable antecedents from contesting, strict disclosure norms, and public funding in elections require political will and effective legislation. The political parties and successive governments are guilty of inaction in the face of a mounting crisis of legitimacy of the political process on account of criminalization and use of unaccounted money power.

In this debate the various easily remediable flaws in the voter registration and polling process distorting our elections have been largely ignored. The Lok Satta movement, as a part of its Election Watch campaign for voter awareness, has studied the flaws in voter registration and polling irregularities. Both these can be easily corrected by changes in procedures and rules and do not need new legislation. The answers are simple, once the problems are clearly identified. Correction of registration flaws and elimination of polling irregularities are fundamental to the purity of the election process. What is more, there is no political resistance to these reforms. First let us understand the process in actual operation.

Every citizen of India age 18 years or above who has registered as a voter is eligible to vote. Citizens declared by courts as mentally unstable and those disqualified for electoral offences are ineligible to vote.

The Election Commission prepares new rolls and revises the existing ones from time to time, normally before every general election to the Lok Sabha and assemblies. They may also be revised on the instructions of the Election Commission before a bye-election. Theoretically, additions and changes in the rolls can be made at any time, but in reality accessing them at ordinary times is a painstaking process.

When special revisions are not called for, the voter lists may be checked only at the office of the taluk revenue officer or in the municipal office. And once the elections are announced and the election process is underway, changes are difficult to make. Legally, additions and deletions may be made until just before the deadline for filing nominations. But from a practical viewpoint, it is best to have one’s name included or any changes made when the Election Commission calls for such periodic revisions.

 

 

Voter lists are prepared for each assembly constituency in the local official language. The list for each assembly constituency is divided into ‘parts’. Each part usually pertains to a polling booth. Each assembly constituency (assigned a constituency number) and each polling booth (part number) are numbered for easy access and retrieval of information. The names of voters in each part (polling booth) of the roll are arranged according to house numbers and their names are numbered consecutively. Usually a part of the roll represents a defined geographical area. But sometimes the male and female voters may be segregated, and in such cases there may be two parts pertaining to the same household.

The local revenue official (tehsildar or mandal revenue officer) is normally the person in charge of the electoral registration process. During this process he is called the assistant electoral registration officer (AERO), and he functions under his superior (sub-divisional magistrate or revenue divisional officer), who is called the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO). The district magistrate/collector/deputy commissioner is the District Election Officer under whose supervision electoral rolls are prepared and published.

In cities of certain states, the electoral registration work may be entrusted to municipal corporation officials. The electoral registration officials prepare the rolls based on birth and death registers, available census data, field surveys, door-to-door enumeration and other available information. The electoral roll contains the name of the voter and details such as the name of the father/husband, age, residential address. Generally the age of the voter is noted as on 1 January of the year in which the revision is carried out. If the voter list is prepared after April, the age as on 1 April is noted.

As soon as the electoral roll for a constituency is ready, the registration officer publishes (displays in his office and such other places as may be prescribed by the Election Commission) the draft by making a copy of it available for inspection and displaying a notice to the public. The EC widely publicizes the release of revised electoral rolls. Two copies of each electoral roll are supplied to recognized political parties free of cost. As per law the draft electoral roll should be displayed at each polling booth (the concerned ‘part’) in each village for the people to examine. The EC expects all objections to be made at that time. However, the electoral rolls are not displayed everywhere and officers discharge their duties in a casual and perfunctory manner and the people’s involvement in the revision of electoral rolls is minimal.

 

 

Because it is difficult to make changes to the electoral rolls once the revision is complete, it is best to add or delete names during the update undertaken by the Election Commission. Citizens can then inspect the electoral rolls, and if they find that their names are missing, can file claims for inclusion in Form 6. Citizens should register only in one polling station, generally the one closest to their residence. If there is any objection to the inclusion of a name in a roll, an objection can be filed in Form 7 by any person whose name is already included in that roll. Every change to the details in an entry in the roll (spelling, age, name of father, address, gender, etc.) should be filed in Form 8 by the voter. Similarly, a request for change of polling station (part number) is filed in Form 8A by the voter, and a request for deletion of entry due to death, migration etc., by any enrolled voter in Form 8B. (Table 1)

 

 

All such objections and requests should be filed before the due date prescribed by the EC. The registration officer then holds a summary inquiry into every such claim and objection after giving notice to the applicant and the public and records his decision. The registration officer may also correct the electoral rolls by including names inadvertently omitted, deleting names of persons who died or persons who are no longer residents of the area. The final electoral roll including a list of amendments is then published.

This process appears fair and reasonable. But in reality citizens have little knowledge of the process, nor do they have access to voter lists or appropriate forms for filing claims or objections. Therefore, by default the voter list carries many errors of omission and commission. It is this huge margin of error and inaccessibility of the voter list and the bureaucratic registration process which make our electoral rolls defective.

All such errors could of course be corrected. But this process is cumbersome, non-transparent, inaccessible and generally ineffective. The first difficulty arises with the non-availability of electoral rolls. As explained above, at the time of revision of electoral rolls, the EC publishes (displays) the voter list in select offices. But if the voter wishes to access electoral rolls to verify whether or not his name appears, he has to obtain a copy of the voter list for the polling booth (part)/constituency.

These voter lists are available with the electoral registration officials and are supplied for a fee, usually equivalent to charges for photocopying. Citizens are often unaware of this procedure and do not know where to obtain electoral rolls, the fee payable, constituency number and the part number for which we need electoral rolls and even where the electoral registration office is located.

 

 

Moreover, in many states one cannot even pay cash to obtain the electoral rolls. You may have to go to the nearest government treasury office (most people wouldn’t know where the treasury is located. Villagers would have to go to tehsil headquarters) and make the payment by a challan, which itself is a long drawn out process. In order to make a payment by challan, a proper application has to be made indicating the appropriate head of account to which the fee is to be remitted.

It is not surprising that ordinary citizens are unable to access electoral rolls by following this tortuous bureaucratic process. If by a miracle, you do manage to get a copy of the electoral roll and if you find that your name is missing, or a dead person’s name is included, you will then have to apply in the appropriate form. The forms are theoretically available with the electoral registration officer, but more often they are either not available or when available, not in the local language. Once the form is obtained, the application should be made in duplicate.

 

 

How does one register to vote? As with all governmental procedures, inclusion of one’s name is a rather pain-staking process. To give you an idea of the difficulty involved we narrate below the travails of Ramayya, a farm worker, who decided to check whether his name was registered. Ramayya was one of the few who knew that electoral rolls are available for a fee at the local revenue office and that this fee has to be paid to a particular head of account.

1. He must first go to the tehsil headquarters which may be located 25-50 kms away from his home.

2. He must visit the tehsil office and ask them to provide the following information: (a) the constituency no. and the part no. relating to his village; (b) the fee to be paid to get a copy of the voter list for that polling booth; and (c) the head of account to which the fee should be remitted.

3. If the tehsil officials oblige him (in our administrative set up it is impossible for Ramayya to obtain all this information in a single day) he will have to go to the treasury. Although the rolls are available at the tehsil office, the payment to get a copy of the rolls is to be made at the treasury which is located in another building, or sometimes in another town not always close by. He must reach before the treasury closes, ask for the appropriate form and fill it. If for any reason Ramayya does not know the head of account, payment will not be accepted. Usually the fee payable to obtain the electoral roll for a polling station area (‘part’) will be of the order of Rs 5 to 10.

4. He takes the challan back to the election registration office (tehsil office) and submits it with a request for a copy of the voters list.

5. If the voter lists are readily available, the tehsil officials may condescend to supply a copy.

6. He then verifies if his name is there (in the meantime the office could close for the day).

7. If he does not find his name, he must ask for Form 6. Though free, most often these forms are not available and when available are not in the regional language (often they are in English). If he manages to get one he has to fill out the four page form in duplicate and file it with the tehsil office (which normally functions as the electoral registration office).

8. According to the rules, once the form is submitted, he should get an acknowledgement. This acknowledgement is the detachable part of Form 6. Even so, an acknowledgement is hardly ever given to anyone.

9. Ramayya then goes home and waits. The rules prescribe that he should expect a response in 10 days. Meanwhile, the electoral registration officer will publish (display) Ramayya’s application in his office notice board and ask for objections if any. Objections are to be filed within one week.

10. If an objection is received, the electoral registration officer will conduct a summary inquiry. He might call the objector, and if he deems it necessary send a notice to Ramayya asking him to appear personally. On the basis of this inquiry the electoral registration officer will make a decision on Ramayya’s application. The decision has to be intimated to Ramayya in writing. This ‘action taken report’ is also a detachable part of Form 6, but in reality no one ever receives the report. So until election day, there is uncertainty whether one’s name has been included.

11. If the ERO decides to register Ramayya’s name as a voter, an amendment will be made to the electoral rolls including his name. For any process – inclusion of name, deletion of name, change of name/address/polling booth a similar exercise has to be undertaken. Only the application form varies.

 

 

If all the residents of Ramayya’s village wish to save time and effort and decide to do this work collectively, the bunch of applications will not be accepted. Each application must be filed personally or sent by post. The above narration is based on Lok Satta’s direct experience in accessing the voter lists and getting names included or deleted.

One can understand from this how the process in reality is totally inaccessible to the common man. Even an educated person must be a motivated citizen willing to spare a lot of energy, time, money and effort in order to verify the electoral roll and register. No wonder the electoral rolls are flawed.

Many eligible persons are often struck out from the voters lists. This is usually done at the behest of powerful politicians or caste leaders in order to disenfranchise voters who may vote against their wishes. In the last general election in Thane, it was reported that even persons with voter identity cards found their names struck off with a red pen. In the guise of revision or correction, the government/party in power may delete names of people who are not likely to vote for them or add fictitious or ineligible names in order to indulge in bogus voting. This is possible as the administrative machinery in charge of voter registration is controlled by the elected government. But then there have also been instances when ministers, MLAs and even Election Commission officials couldn’t find their own names on the rolls.

 

 

Pre-poll verification of electoral rolls: As the accuracy of voter lists is an important aspect of the elections, a pilot project for this study was undertaken by Lok Satta during February-March 1999. The available lists, i.e. mother list prepared in 1995 and supplementary lists prepared in 1996 and 1998 were procured. Electoral lists for five parts, i.e., three in assembly constituency 211, and two in assembly constituency 210, were verified. The study revealed large variations as seen below (Table 2).

This pilot verification was limited to Hyderabad city area and its surroundings. Most of the deletions required were due to a change of residence by the voter. Such shifts could be outside the polling station, constituency, state or country. (Shifts within polling booth limits was ignored in the survey.)

Similarly, about 30% of additions were due to people moving into the area; about 23% were new additions (persons attaining 18 years), 15% due to migration and the rest for other reasons which include omission in the earlier enumeration. It was interesting that supplementary lists were prepared perfunctorily every year since 1995. A 40% plus error of omission and commission was noted in the Lok Satta pilot survey demonstrating that the Election Commission’s periodic revisions failed to rectify defects. Similar verifications were conducted by Lok Satta volunteers in most district towns of Andhra Pradesh, and the results showed a recurring and uniform pattern of about 40% error in electoral rolls in most urban areas.

 

 

Post-election survey: Immediately after the general elections in 1999, Lok Satta tried to obtain copies of a few ‘marked electoral rolls’. These are voter lists available after the polling, in which the names of those who voted are marked by the polling officials. We sought them in order to do a house-to-house survey of each voter shown to have voted in order to verify the authenticity of the votes cast. We deliberately chose areas free of violence or complaints of rigging, booth capturing or large scale impersonation. As the election authorities refused to supply copies, political parties were approached for the rolls marked by their agents.

The survey was completed within three weeks of polling. This was difficult, particularly in urban areas, as each voter had to be personally interviewed to verify whether a vote had been cast. The complexity of the survey, the refusal of election authorities to furnish official lists of those who voted, the need for urgency and the limitation of resources forced us to restrict this post-polling survey of voters to only five polling stations. The results of our survey are recorded below (Table 3).

 

 

This survey was conducted in areas where no rigging or irregularities were officially reported and polling was conducted peacefully. The polling of 53% of votes, which is less than the average polling, indicates that there was no unusual rigging. In fact the number of those who reported to having voted personally was much lower; it worked out to only 41.3% of the total voters registered! 538 voters whose votes were polled were thus listed as doubtful votes. Of these, 190 voters (7.6% of the votes polled) could not have voted in person, whereas the other 348 votes amounting to 14.1% of votes polled pertain to persons residing elsewhere.

It is possible that a few of the voters who had moved into another area of the city might have voted where they were earlier registered. Ascertaining the facts in such cases is both cumbersome and prohibitively expensive. But it is reasonable to assume that many persons from distant areas in a big city might not have voted. It is unlikely that those who shifted to other towns or villages would have visited Hyderabad on polling day merely to vote. The total number of such false and doubtful votes formed 21.7% of the votes polled. Of them, 7.6% were clearly false votes and 14.1% doubtful.

 

 

Statewide verification of electoral rolls on sample basis: The variations noted during the pilot surveys (pre-poll and post-poll) were appalling. In addition, variations in different sectors have to be studied to obtain a realistic estimate of errors in the electoral rolls. A statewide sample survey has been planned with the technical advice of statistical experts. Though electoral lists are prepared constituency-wise, the administrative units for electoral registration are revenue mandals (equivalent of taluks/tehsils in other states, but smaller in size) in all districts, and municipal corporation in the city of Hyderabad.

Our earlier experience shows that there is likely to be a greater number of errors in towns and cities than in villages. Keeping this in view, the entire population was divided into a broad category of rural and urban; again the urban areas into municipal corporations and other municipalities. Attention was given to the ‘slums’ segment in municipal corporations. Normally a sample proportional to population size would have been good enough. But in view of the highly varying error noticed during the pilot surveys in urban areas, a bigger sample was allotted for urban areas.

The objective of the sample survey was not merely to find errors in the list, but to ascertain the reasons for variations to the extent possible.

 

 

An effort was made to ascertain the number of first time voters to be registered because of attaining voting age, deletions on account of migration and their inclusion in the rolls elsewhere, and if migrant population went back to their old residences to exercise their vote. We also enquired whether the electoral registration mechanism was satisfactory and whether voters would prefer a user friendly agency like the post office for registration. For deletions, it was proposed to specify reasons like death, migration, foreign emigration and other errors like duplicate entries, fictitious names and so on. The survey conducted by volunteers was spread over a few months. During this intervening period the lists were updated as on 1.1.2000 and 1.1.2001. Hence, lists updated as on date of survey were verified.

The work is incomplete in several districts, but the data collected so far reveals large variations and differences in variations over different strata (Table 4).

Lok Satta’s findings conform to voter experience at every election. Errors in electoral rolls to a tune of 15% in rural areas and 40% in urban areas are unacceptable in a democracy. It is possible that there are fewer errors in voter registration in other states, but even half this number of errors seriously distorts elections and undermines the legitimacy of the political process. As the sample survey in Hyderabad city after the 1999 polls showed, there is a possibility of bogus voting of up to 21% in urban areas when identity cards are not mandatory. But experience elsewhere shows that identity cards may not be adequate to ensure fair polling for quite some time to come.

Lok Satta organized Election Watch in Kolkatta in 2001 during the state assembly elections. A ‘help line’ with 20 telephone lines was widely advertised for voters to lodge complaints. Of the complaints received on polling day, an astonishing 30% claimed that their vote was cast fraudulently by the time they reached the polling station. This happened in an election in which a voter identity card or other forms of establishing identity was mandatory to vote. Collusion or coercion of polling staff and polling agents of opponents, plays a major role in elections. We should, therefore, look at simple, practical solutions to improve the voter registration process to make it transparent, and look for methods of eliminating or limiting voting fraud.

Although voting eligibility is the same for Parliament, assembly, and local bodies, the electoral rolls for local bodies in certain states are different. Not only does it add to the expenditure, it makes revision of electoral rolls expensive and time consuming. A more serious problem is that room for falsification is enhanced. Therefore, there should be common electoral rolls for all elections.

Happily, though errors in voter registration are common, they are also the most easily remediable of defects in our electoral process. All that is required is to evolve a process that is voter friendly. Each polling station contains no more than 700-1000 names. If electoral rolls can be made accessible (displayed) to citizens at all times for easy inspection in a neighbourhood facility, and are available for sale at a nominal price, much of the problem can be corrected.

If the appropriate statutory forms (Forms 6 , 7, 8, 8A and 8B) are locally available free or at nominal cost, the voter can present the application, obtain an acknowledgement and await written communication of decision taken on his application. The local public office can be made responsible for acknowledging applications and communicating action taken. All these changes can be brought about by a mere revision of rules and procedures, and no amendment of law is involved. Statutory forms (Form 6,7,8, 8A and 8B) should be available free or for a small fee in the post office. The forms could be made available at the post office and filed, giving details for inclusion or deletion.

 

 

There are two public offices locally accessible to all citizens – the village panchayat and the post office. In urban areas, the municipality or corporation is always accessible but it caters to a much larger number of citizens. It would be best if the post office is made the nodal agency for supply of electoral rolls, supply and receipt of statutory forms, acknowledgement of application and communication of action taken reports.

The revenue or municipal office can be the actual decision-making authority in respect of such applications, as is the current practice. All we need is to make the process transparent, accessible and verifiable by citizens locally. There is a post office in every village that is widely regarded as a user-friendly public institution.

The post office has a culture of across-the-table transactions in real time. Any citizen can be given access to the voter list pertaining to the local polling station(s) for inspection to verify the accuracy of entries. All such applications can be received at the post office and an acknowledgement given to the applicant. The post office will then transmit them to the revenue or municipal or panchayat office, as decided by the Election Commission, for enquiry and determination as to whether or not to accept the application. The action taken can be communicated within a period of say one month to the post office, and from there to the citizen.

 

 

In order to save public money on postage, applications and action taken reports can be bulk transferred, and the citizen asked to verify the action at the post office. The post office can maintain a register of applications and the action taken reports received from the electoral registration officials. Such a register can be kept open for public scrutiny during office hours. There can be common electoral rolls for all elections – legislative assembly and panchayat or municipality.

The panchayat or municipal offices too can be made nodal agencies for display or supply of electoral rolls, statutory forms, receipt of applications and communication of action taken reports. There can even be change of rules to make the panchayat or municipality responsible for revision of electoral rolls, addition or deletion of names, and correction of entries. In such cases the process will be much simpler as the post office and panchayat will be located in the same village. In case the panchayat’s decision is unsatisfactory, there can be provision for an appeal to the appropriate revenue official. Display of electoral rolls on Internet, supply of soft copies of electoral rolls in CD ROMs and availability of statutory forms on internet for down loading are other means by which the process can be made accessible and verifiable.

While this process of accessible and verifiable voter registration through local post offices involves simple and easy changes in procedures and rules, it will mark the most significant improvement in our electoral process at no additional cost. Even though a sizeable percentage of the voting population is illiterate, this will enable the literate population, civil society groups, voluntary organizations, and local political activists to verify the process and check irregularities. The very openness and accessibility of the voter lists and statutory forms will make a marked difference to electoral registration, and improve the quality of electoral rolls.

 

 

Measures to curb polling irregularities: While we have outstanding men and women in public service, a flawed electoral process has alienated them from the political and electoral arena. The persons best equipped to represent the people find it impossible to contest if they adhere to law and propriety. Hence we see that parties nominate only ‘winnable’ candidates who can play and survive in the rough and tumble of what passes off for politics in India today.

In India, winning an election is not about party ideology or manifesto, choice of candidate, campaign strategy and such other traditional democratic methods. Parties and candidates often focus their attention on the polling process for those all-important nine or ten hours when ballots are cast. In order to manipulate the polling process to gain unfair advantage, the candidates only require to master the ‘art’ of polling manipulation.

Much of the election expenditure in India goes towards illegal activities of buying votes with money and liquor, hiring hoodlums to browbeat and coerce voters and bribing officials and policemen to connive in polling irregularities and rigging. It is the severity of these electoral malpractices that makes it impossible for honest and public spirited citizens to contest and win by fair means. Electoral irregularities do not guarantee victory, as the nefarious practices of one candidate are neutralized by those of the others. But an incapacity to muster muscle and money power and distort the polling process guarantee defeat! That is why though the macro level electoral verdicts seem to be broadly reflective of public opinion trends, at the ground level the picture is altogether different. In order to enhance chances of victory, parties are compelled to nominate ‘winnable’ candidates who can deploy money and muscle power.

There are exceptions, but they are increasingly rare, and usually unsuccessful. Given this backdrop, regardless of who wins the election, the people are the losers. Even as there is change of players’ fortunes in the power game, the process of governance continues to sink deeper into the morass of corruption, incompetence, arbitrariness, injustice and callousness.

Fortunately, there are simple, practical and effective ways of curbing polling irregularities; more significantly, all these measures can be implemented within the purview of the present electoral law. What is required is a change of procedures where needed, and a firm resolve to effectively implement these measures.

Voter identity cards and electronic voting machines (EVMs) have been progressively introduced by the Election Commission. In addition, widespread use of tendered votes as a means of verification of the purity of election process has great potential in checking rigging.

 

 

Tendered votes: Where prior identification of voter by verifiable means is not a precondition for voting, there are measures to check false voting and impersonation. In such cases, the polling agent has the opportunity to object to a person casting a vote on grounds of false identity. Such a challenged vote is then decided by the presiding officer at the polling station on the basis of a summary enquiry. However, polling agents cannot be expected to know the voters. Sometimes the polling agents act in collusion with opponents. There are areas where the dominance of one caste or group is so pronounced that polling agents are not available for certain candidates, or when available, are easily intimidated. Therefore, the availability of polling agents is not a sufficient safeguard against polling malpractices. Other measures to curb rigging and impersonation should be considered.

 

 

It is common knowledge that many voters go to polling booths and return disappointed on finding their votes cast by others impersonating them. In such cases, the voter can establish his identity by some means or other, and seek a tendered ballot. However, this provision is not widely known. Even if such a tendered vote is cast, under the present rules it has no validity. The sealed cover is opened only in the event of a court order on an election petition. In effect, impersonation is rewarded in elections.

The tendered vote is an indisputable proof of rigging and false voting. No matter what form rigging takes, its one inevitable manifestation is a false vote being cast in the name of another person. The Election Commission can direct that if the tendered votes exceed say 1% of the valid votes polled in a polling station, there shall be automatic repolling. If below 1%, the Commission can direct that the tendered votes shall be counted along with the ballots in the ballot box.

If false voting is high, then tendered votes will exceed 1%, and there will be a repoll. Once it is known that large scale impersonation and rigging, proved through tendered vote percentage, will inevitably lead to a re-poll, it will act as a disincentive. Rigging and false voting by impersonation would be significantly curbed.

Appropriate rules and procedures need to be evolved to apply these measures in respect of electronic voting machines (EVMs). These provisions for re-polling do not need a change in the law and can be incorporated through rules and guidelines.

 

 

Much needs to be done to cleanse our electoral process. But the first step is to improve voter registration through greater access to citizens, and simplified procedures. Once the registration process is demystified and made people friendly, millions of public spirited citizens, activist groups and political workers could play a proactive role to cleanse the electoral rolls. A second step is to recognize the tendered vote as proof of rigging, and ordering a repoll when such votes exceed a predetermined norm. In the November 2000 presidential election in the US, one in 200,000 votes in the country affected the outcome in Florida state, and determined the presidency.

It is absurd if we accepted anything less than near perfection in voter registration and fair polling. Much can be effected by procedural changes, and does not require reworking the law. The EC has emerged over the years as a truly independent, impartial constitutional authority enjoying high credibility and respect. Once it addresses these two issues, it will result in significant improvement in our electoral process. A lot more remains to be done to prevent criminals from contesting and check the role of black money in elections. But these vital first steps will pave way to more momentous reforms.

 

TABLE 1

Different Forms for Different Purposes

 

Form No.	Purpose
6	Inclusion of name
7	Objection to inclusion of name
8	Change of any entry (name, spelling, age, gender etc.)
8 A	Change of polling station within the constituency, change of polling station outside the constituency
8 B	Deletion of entry due to death or migration

 

AC No./Part No.	No. of voters in the list	No. of voters verified	Additions required (% to verified voters)	Deletions required (% to verified voters)	Total Variations (Additions + Deletions)Col.4+5	% of variations (Col 6) to voters verified (Col 3)
(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)
210/54	981	825	16 ( 1.9)	79 (9.6)	95	11.52
210/144	1296	1296	478 (36.9)	300 (23.1)	778	60.03
211/47	4135	1154	205 (17.7)	136 (11.8)	341	29.55
211/229	1638	418	217 (51.9)	136 (32.5)	353	84.45
211/231	572	400	202 (50.5)	182 (45.5)	384	96.0

Source: Lok Satta’s Research Data – 2000.

 

TABLE 3

Post-Polling Survey of Select Polling Station Areas

(1999 Assembly and Parliamentary Polls, Hyderabad, AP)

 

			No. not voted or doubtful cases
Assembly Constituency/Polling Booth No.	No. of voters	No. of voters polled	No. who reported that they actually ‘voted’	Residing in the area but not voted	Left the are but residing within the city	Left the city/country ‘voted’	Total	% of doubtful and ‘not voted’
(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)
207/173	1143	625	483	5	91	46	142	22.7
207/176	956	459	377	15	41	26	82	17.9
209/93	725	428	306	20	95	7	122	28.5
209/75	989	495	380	42	72	1	115	23.2
210/426	893	476	399	22	49	6	77	16.2
Total	4706	2483	1945	104	348	86	538	21.7

Source: Lok Satta – Research and Documentation Cell.

 

 

 

Particulars of Electoral			Deletions Required (Errors of Commission)							Additions Required (Errors of					Total Errors
District	No. of polling stations	No. of voters		Moved out of the area)	Death	Other*	Total	% to voters	Attained 18 years of age		Moved into the area	Total	% to	Total number		% to voters registered
Survey of Rural Polling Stations
E.G.	4	1289		166	36		202	15.7	31		50	81	6.3	283		22.0
W.G.	2	2086		37	52		89	4.3	24		23	47	2.3	136		6.5
Krishna	1	416		27	13	1	41	9.9	12		3	15	3.6	56		13.5
Prakasam	2	1297		43	38	2	83	6.4	34		12	46	3.5	129		9.9
Nellore	4	3084		87	79	15	181	5.9	60		100	160	5.2	341		11.1
Chittoor	2	1762		143	37	90	270	15.3	47		110	157	8.9	427		24.2
Kurnool	4	4648		488	71	1	560	12.0	82		128	210	4.5	770		16.6
Warangal	2	1399		51	15	4	70	5.0	7		12	19	1.4	89		6.4
M’bnagar	1	344		32	11		43	12.5	35		12	47	13.7	90		26.2
Karimnagar	5	3956		549	100	59	708	17.9	78		142	220	5.6	928		23.5
Khammam	2	2016		11	36	12	59	2.9	37		0	37	1.8	96		4.8
Rural Total	29	22297		1634	488	184	2306	10.34	447		592	1039	4.7	3345		15.10
Survey of Urban Polling Stations
Vizag	3	1298		355	22	17	394	30.4	82		413	495	38.1	889		68.5
E.Godavari	3	419		78	14	0	92	22.0	39		85	124	29.6	216		51.6
W.Godavari	2	1491		121	12		133	8.9	46		179	225	15.1	358		24.0
Krishna	3	1919		690	35	0	725	37.8	53		500	553	28.8	1278		66.6
Kurnool	3	1796		419	43	28	490	27.3	62		90	152	8.5	642		35.7
Nalgonda	1	797		273	5	2	280	35.1	34		125	159	19.9	439		55.1
Warangal	2	1863		320	28	30	378	20.3	43		74	117	6.3	495		26.6
Guntur	5	4060		1039	83	92	1214	29.9	209		604	813	20.0	2027		49.9
Hyderabad	5	4459		923	31	42	996	22.3	85		691	776	17.4	1772		39.7
Urban Total	27	18102		4218	273	211	4702	26.0	653		2761	3414	18.9	8116		44.8
Rural+Urban	56	40399		5852	761	395	7008	17.3	1100		3353	4453	11.0	11461		28.4

*[under-aged/ineligible/fictitious]; Source: Lok Satta’s Research Data – 2000.