[Advocate Farheen Siddiqui at the office of District Collector Dr Vipin Itankar Friday. (Video grab)]
Nagpur: A number of Muslim voters Friday April 19, 2024 staged an impromptu protest at District Collector Office in Nagpur, Maharashtra after they found their names missing from the voters list.
Senior BJP Leader and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari is seeking re-election from Nagpur in Maharashtra which went to the polls in the first of seven phase Parliamentary Election Friday.
Nitin Gadkari, two time MP from Nagpur, is pitted against Vikas Thakra of Congress, Thakre is supported by all INDIA alliance partners including NCP (Sharad Pawar) and Shiv Sena (UBT).
Muslim voters, mainly from Mominpura area of the City, alleged that they could not cast their vote as they found their names missing from the voter list.
Shocked and angered, they went to the office of District Magistrate, Dr Vipin Itankar, and staged strong protest.
Talking on camera at the District Collector Office, the Muslim voters showed their Voter ID Cards.
They said they have the Voter ID Card issued by the Election Commission of India. But they could not cast their vote as their names were not in the voters list.
“Names of mostly Muslim voters, including my family members, are missing from the voters list”, advocate Farheen Siddiqui, a resident of Anand Nagar in Nagpur, said in a video.
Nabeela Khan, another voter, said she had cast her vote in the last elections. But this time her name is missing from the voters list.
“I have cast my vote in the last five elections. But, I found my name missing from the voter list when I came to vote today”, she claimed.
Yasmeen Akbar, a resident of Mominpura, said the name of her husband, who died due to Covid-19, was in the list but her name was missing.
#2024Polls: A number of Muslim voters Friday April 19, 2024 staged an impromptu protest at District Collector Office in #Nagpur, #Maharashtra after they found their names missing from the voters list.#ParliamentElection2024 #Phase1Voting #LokSabhaElections2024 pic.twitter.com/dw91S2Sh6u
— ummid.com (@ummid) April 19, 2024
Another Muslim voter from the same area said the names of his dead family members were in the list but the one who are alive and went to vote their names are missing.
“We don’t understand, what is going on”, he said.
ummid.com could not independently verify the video it received. The District Collector, Itankar, could not be contacted for his reponse.
There were also complaints from citizens at many polling stations in South-West Nagpur who said names of many voters in the "MT" series of identity cards issued by the Election Commission were not in the voters list.
Also in Nagpur, a Dalit youth protesting against the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM), threw ink on them and disrupted the polling.
Meanwhile, polling for the first Phase of Lok Sabha elections was held Friday April 19, 2024 for 102 seats spread across 21 States and Union Territories (UTs) with reports of violence and protest against the Electronic Voting Machines from some states.
The average voter turnout till 9 pm was 62.37 per cent, according to the Election Commission of India, a number which is lower than the 2019 elections when the polling percentage was 69.43%.
The highest polling percentage was recorded in Tripura at 80.17 followed by West Bengal which register a voter turnout of 77.57%.
The lowest turnout recorded in Bihar is 47.49%.
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