K'taka CEO directs district authorities to check voter survey by private agencies

Bengaluru: With reports about private agencies conducting door-to-door surveys of voters even after the alleged electoral data theft scam coming to light, the Chief Electoral Officer of Karnataka Manoj Kumar Meena on Friday directed the district election officers not to allow such activities by private agencies.

In a statement, Meena said there were some media reports that in a few districts some private agencies visited houses and procured personal information of the voters either manually or through IT applications.

“In this regard, the Election Commission of India has directed all District Election Officers to take adequate steps to ensure that any potential capture of data by any private agency by way of house-to-house survey, use of misleading I-cards, any attempt of voter data collection either by a private entity or otherwise and any authentication/NoC by DEOs/EROs to any private entity is strictly prohibited,” the order said.

The order came at a time when the director and executive of a private entity Chilume Educational, Cultural and Rural Development Institute (Chilume Trust) were arrested on charges of issuing booth-level officers card to their employees in an unauthorised way.

According to the government authorities, only the retired government employees should be hired by the government agency as the Booth-level Officers (BLO) and no one else. Anyone else becoming BLO is impersonation, they added.

The Congress has alleged that the Chilume Trust was stealing voter data and was involved in the addition and deletion of voters from the electoral roll.

Based on the charges, the Election Commission has directed the scrutiny of electoral rolls in three Assembly constituencies of Bengaluru and suspension of two Indian Administrative Service officers.