Acting on a tip-off from a rival political party, police seized electoral rolls and voter slips from Congress workers at Majestic on Monday.
The Congress workers were found distributing voter slips bearing their candidate’s name and the party symbol. The electoral rolls and the voter slips appear to have been printed out from the election commission’s website. It’s illegal to distribute voter slips by stamping them with the name of any candidate or the symbol of a political party, a senior police officer said.
Police are waiting for election commission officials to ascertain if there are any loopholes in the distribution of voters slips and if it’s okay to download the electoral rolls without permission from the poll body.
“We have informed the BBMP commissioner, who is on the way. The returning officers have also been apprised of the seizure and they also are on the way. Depending on their scrutiny, a case may be taken up,” said B K Singh, Additional Commissioner of Police (West).
Later in the night, electoral officers along with the police raided a complex and allegedly detained 16 people printing duplicate voter IDs, a source said. At least 10 computers and a printer were seized from the third floor of Prabhat Complex, Gandhinagar. They were printing duplicate voter IDs of people who hadn’t voted in the last 15 years. But police denied the raid, adding there were no arrests or detentions.