IMPHAL, May 2: In a shocking turn of events at the IMC polls today, two IFP reporters were denied their voting rights as someone had already cast votes in their name by proxy.
IFP reporter B Bisheswar Sharma is a bonafide voter of Ward no. 18 of Yaiskul assembly constituency.
He said, he stood in a long queue at the Brahmapur Nahabam Basketball ground complex polling station, waiting for my turn to exercise my right. When his turn came the polling official inform him that his vote has already been cast.
This brought the election process to a temporary pause as he protested and asked them to verify his credentials and to the officials and polling agents present in the room, although nothing came out in his favour.
Adding salt to injury, he found out that the same proxy voting has been done in the case of his wife also.
The polling officer present in the room blamed the election agents and told us repeatedly to “come to an amicable solution” since the voting process must go on without much delay, he said.
Bisheswar called up the Returning Officer on mobile number 8258986913 which was responded by some other official who said the RO has gone for a round trip of polling stations.
The whole episode was narrated to the person on the phone and he was assured that they will respond to the situation without fail. But, nothing came out of the complaint.
The other IFP reporter who also became a victim of proxy voting is Jimmy Leivon.
In polling station 22/1 in Wangkhei Assembly, Jimmy and a handful of other voters were left high and dry as their voting right had already been stolen through proxy voting.
What is more remarkable was that this particular polling station has 90 percent voter’s turnout of the total 918 votes as the voting process comes to an end at 4pm.
Polling personnel and security at this particular polling station had apparently given a free run to inner agents.
When he demanded an explanation, the polling officials claimed that they could not detect who is a genuine voter or proxy and it was up to the inner agents to detect such cases.
