A political and legal dispute has intensified in Karnataka’s Vijayapura district after three complaints alleging attempts to remove living voters from electoral rolls were reported during the SIR exercise, including one case naming Vijayapura City MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal in an FIR.
The case involving Yatnal concerns Abdul Razak, a 50-year-old vegetable trader from Vijayapura. Razak alleged that a purported fake death certificate showing him as deceased was submitted to the Vijayapura City Corporation Commissioner along with a letter on the MLA’s letterhead on September 3. The application allegedly sought the deletion of his name from the electoral roll.
Razak said he was alive and remained a voter in the Vijayapura City Assembly constituency. He sought action over what he described as the submission of a fake death certificate. The report did not provide details of the specific sections invoked in the FIR or an official response from Yatnal.
Two other cases have also been reported from the district. Javed, a businessman from Nisaramaddi and a voter in Ward 30 of the Vijayapura City Assembly constituency, alleged that Girish Patil, also known as Biradar, submitted a Form 7 application claiming that Javed did not reside at his permanent address. Javed said he had provided his details to the Booth Level Officer during the SIR exercise and alleged that false documents were created to support the deletion request.
In the third case, Hajilal Kambirsab Kottalagi, a farmer from Tikota, alleged that six people submitted Form 7 applications seeking deletion of his name. He said the applications falsely claimed that he did not live at his address, although he was a permanent resident of Tikota. Kottalagi also alleged that similar applications had been filed in the cases of other Muslim voters.
The complainants in the first two cases alleged that such attempts could affect the voting rights of Muslim voters and create divisions between communities. Those claims are part of the complaints and have not been independently established in the report.
The dispute has also drawn allegations from the other side of the political divide. At a press meeting, Vijayapura City Corporation member Premanand Biradar alleged that the name of the father of Vijayapura district Congress general secretary Irfan Sheikh, who died about a year ago, continued to appear in the draft electoral roll. Biradar alleged that Sheikh was a Congress BLA-2 and that Razia Begum, who lived in the same locality, was the Booth Level Officer. He sought an inquiry into the alleged irregularity.
Swami Vivekananda Sene president Chandrashekhar Chowdhary said his organisation would seek registration of an FIR against Sheikh and legal action over the alleged retention of a deceased person’s name on the roll. The report did not state whether such an FIR had been registered.
The cases place the verification of electoral-roll changes at the centre of Vijayapura’s SIR-related dispute. Form 7 applications are used to seek deletion of names from electoral rolls, while Booth Level Officers are involved in the field-level verification of voter details. The competing allegations now involve both the alleged removal of living voters and the alleged retention of a deceased voter’s name.
The immediate official next steps are the investigation of the reported complaints and any inquiry ordered into the competing allegations concerning the draft electoral roll.
