NEW DELHI: Amid a row over the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, BJP on Friday stepped up its defence of the exercise by citing large-scale anomalies which are behind a big chunk of notices and targeted the Opposition for turning a legitimate process into an issue.Citing data, a combative BJP general secretary (organisation) B L Santhosh said less than nine months’ difference among siblings is behind 6.4% of the notices issued in Delhi, while 2.5% pertain to the gap between the age of voter and parents being more than 50 years.He said 5% of notices were triggered as difference between the age of voter and parent is less than 15 years, while 4.2% notices stemmed from someone having six or more children.In 2.3% of cases, difference between the age of voter and grandparents is less than 40 years, Santhosh pointed out. He said, “Are you wondering why there’s so much political storm over SIR? These are reasons. Which forces want these names to remain in the voters list? Which parties benefited from this voters’ list all these years? Which party and family created a system which kept such names in voters’ lists for decades? Why was SIR not held regularly all these decades? Nation wants answers for these.
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“The aggressive response, though in keeping with BJP’s stand that poll rolls needed to be cleansed to strike off illegal immigrants, the deceased and the doubly registered, stood out because it coincided with Opposition’s attack on CEC Gyanesh Kumar for allegedly making decisions unilaterally about SIR which, according to it, is aimed at manipulating voter lists.
