Fewer names missing from electoral rolls but rationalisation a problem

While the Pune district election administration added lakhs of new names to the voters’ list and there were very few complaints of names missing from the list on Wednesday, November 20, 2024 as compared to the Lok Sabha (LS) elections held earlier this year, voters were disappointed in terms of rationalisation of the list. As such, members of the same family/group were assigned different polling centres causing citizens to run from pillar to post to find the polling centres corresponding to their names.

Vinod Puranik, a senior citizen, said, “We have six voters in our family and we changed our voting constituency last year from Solapur to Pune district as our family moved to Pune. On Wednesday when we went for voting, all six members of our family were assigned different polling centres in the Guruwar Peth area of Kasba Peth constituency.”

Shweta Rajput said, “My husband was assigned a different polling centre from mine and it took us one hour to find that school in Khadakwasla constituency.”

While the Pune district election administration added more than 11 lakh new names to the voters’ list in the last one year, it failed to reorganise the list due to which members of the same family/group were assigned different polling stations/centres inconveniencing citizens no end.

When contacted, Pune district collector Suhas Diwase, said, “We added lakhs of new names to the voters’ list but they were added randomly so members of the same group/family were assigned different polling centres. After the elections are over, we will work on rationalisation of the voters’ list.”