Draft electoral rolls out, state has 4.90 crore voters

Those turning 18 on Jan 1, 2018 can enrol as new voters

Office of the Chief Electoral Officer-Karnataka (OCEO) has published the draft electoral list for the 2018 Assembly polls on its website and will also be launching a special voters' enrolment drive later this month.

Addressing a press conference in Bengaluru on Monday Chief Electoral Oofficer Sanjeev Kumar said the draft electoral rolls of all the 224 Assembly constituencies in the state have been hosted on the website (www.ceokarnataka.kar.nic.in).

He said citizens can find out whether their names appear in the draft electoral rolls by searching on the CEO website. Assembly elections are scheduled to be held in the state during April-May next year.
Those who turn 18 years on January 1, 2018 can enrol their names as new voters. If a name is missing or there needs to be a change or modification, than it can be filed in the relevant forms. Forms are available with the Electoral Registration Officer (EROs) or the Block Level Officers (BLOs) and may also be downloaded from CEO website.

Kumar said there are 7.69 lakh voters in the age group 18-19 years in the draft rolls. A total of 2,433 new polling stations have been created out of which as many as 574 are in Bengaluru. The total numbers of voters in the 2018 draft rolls is 4.90 crore (male: 2.48 crore; female: 2.41 crore and third gender: 4,430).

He said the exact date for the 2018 polls will be decided by the Election Commission of India (ECI) after consulting various stakeholders in the coming months.
He said Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) were tamper-proof and it was impossible to rig them. The ECI is open to receive complaints challenging its claim. The onus of proving that EVMs could be rigged will rest with the complainant. Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail system will be introduced in all the constituencies, he added.

On BJP's charge that several Bangladeshis had enrolled themselves in the voters' list and had procured Electoral Voters Identity Cards, Kumar said the the party could register a complaint with the ECI in this regard.