Voters in lower middle-class areas face harrowing times

Political observers may cite Sunday as being another victory for the democratic process, but citizens had a difficult time casting their votes across the 28 constituencies in Bangalore Urban.

Running from pillar to post, to try and identify their polling stations, many voters were overwhelmed by the sweltering heat and the ‘understaffed’ polling stations. Conditions were most strenuous at polling stations located in lower middle-class areas. Narrow passageways and burly security forces standing guard, coupled with “missing or deleted names,” tried the patience of most citizens who waited in the heat, often for as long as 45 minutes. 

At the New Indian High School in Padarayanapura, seven polling booths were installed, including two sensitive and one hyper-sensitive booths — to cater to an estimated 7,000 voters. All could be accessed by just a single entryway and contained just one exit.

Many of those interviewed agreed that the Election Commission (EC) made a major blunder by concentrating seven polling booths, all positioned along a straight line in the  corridor at the school. The situation was no more agreeable to election officials. “The first problem was that there had been a large number of deletions in the electoral list given to us,” the presiding officer of one polling booth lamented. “Added to this, we were abused by people who had come to vote by braving the hot sun for no less than an hour.”

An IPS observer, Vilas Shinde, echoed the view that the school had been a poor choice. “The EC could not have done more wrong by choosing the school as a polling station,” he said. “With one entry and one exit, we are trying the best we can to ensure that the people are calm and wait for their turn to cast their franchise.”

Massive congestion

At another polling location in Goripalya, an area home to a large community of minorities, the local Urdu school had only a single pathway, measuring just two feet wide, for three polling stations which did not have any ventilation. “People cannot even venture to their polling booth, without obstructing another person coming out of the adjacent booth,” said a police officer on duty here. “It is like managing a one-way traffic street.”

‘Tough to manage crowds’

Polling stations and roads surrounding Neelasandra in Shantinagar constituency were crowded throughout the day due to a lack of space. As many as 10 polling stations were located in different rooms of two adjacent buildings. Security forces and traffic police struggled to maintain law and order as hundreds of voters jostled in the congested space.

With no more space in the building, the long queue of voters spilled onto the street, affecting road traffic. The lack of vehicle parking compounded the problem.
“The room space for polling station number 118 is very small and the narrow space outside the room does not allow more than one person to pass through,” said a police officer on duty. “As many as 1,500 voters were registered under the booth and it became very tough to manage the crowd.”

Christopher A J of Lingarajpuram, who came to Neelsandra to cast his vote, said he spent valuable time moving around the two polling stations in the area trying to discover which booth he could vote in. “However, my name along with three other members in the family is missing,” he said. “Polling officials say our family should have checked the voters’ list when it was being revised months ago. But why should I check my name when I was already registered as a voter some time ago?”

In other locations, no facilities were available for disabled or elderly voters to exercise their franchise. For Lakshmamma (80), having made it to the polling station at Srinagar, it proved a daunting task just to identify her name in the voters’ list. “I have been forced to go from one polling station to the next to find my name,” she said. “There is no mention of it anywhere. At this age, it is difficult for us to come out and vote, let alone find our name by running around.”

For the 74 year-old Chandegowda, who has lost count the number of times he has voted in his life, it was a struggle to reach the polling station in Govindarajnagar. With no ramp or a wheelchair to assist him, he was carried into the polling station by his grandson.