Voters on new list may be less by 10m than on scrapped old list: EC

FE Team | Published: October 25, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

Voters on the new list in the making may be less by some ten million (one crore) than on the scrapped list of 2006 for trimming off the fakes and faults, Election Commission (EC) sources said.
"The reasons for decrease in the number of voters are doing less fault as well as not having duplicate and fake voters on the voter list", Election Commissioner M Sakhawat Hussain told journalists at his office in the city Wednesday, reports UNB.
It was seen in different researches that there were about 12.2 million excess voters on the cancelled voter list, he said. "There is no possibility of it (having excess voter on the list) and so the number of voters will be reduced naturally."
The commissioner said the left-out voters of the areas where the voter-listing task is going to be finished could be enrolled later on.
But, he said, the left-outs would not be enrolled immediate after their application, as the EC would first scrutinise whether they really missed out or not, for which time is required.
"There would be the opportunity of getting registered as voter before announcement of the election schedule", the election commissioner said, expecting that no one would be left out this time from the list.
Sakhawat said the amount of fault this time around is very negligible.
"Only 46 duplicate voters were found among around 0.25 million registered in Rajshahi City Corporation area. Investigation is going on in this regard and steps would be taken in case of any irregularity."
He informed that now it could be identified if anyone tries to be voter in two places in a district and the system would be expanded across the country from June next.
"Then, that means, it could be identified if anyone tried to be voter twice at any place of the country."
Replying to a query, he said Awami League has requested the EC to allow them to join the dialogue on electoral reforms with a 15-member delegation, and the request would 'definitely be considered'.
At first, the EC was in favour of five-member delegation on behalf of the political parties concerned to sit for dialogue with them, but later they allowed 10-member delegation responding to request of the parties.