SIR Awareness Campaign to Ensure Eligible Voters are not Deprived of Voting Rights: J.P. Hegde
Udupi: Former MP K. Jayaprakash Hegde announced that the Congress party will launch a door-to-door awareness campaign in every Assembly constituency of Udupi district to ensure all eligible voters retain their voting rights during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, Hegde said that voting is a constitutional right of every citizen in a democratic system. As the Special Intensive Revision process is currently underway, he urged every voter, Booth Level Agent (BLA), and Congress worker to remain vigilant throughout the exercise.
He said the SIR process intends to ensure the accuracy of electoral rolls. However, due to a lack of awareness or negligence, eligible voters may lose their registration, new voters may fail to enroll, necessary corrections may remain pending, and objections to suspicious entries may not be filed on time.
Hegde claimed that the State Government has effectively delivered six guarantees instead of five and stated that additional welfare schemes would be implemented within the next two years under the leadership of Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar. He also criticized Prime Minister Narendra Modi, alleging that the promise of creating two crore jobs annually has not been fulfilled. Further, he claimed that the Swachh Bharat campaign remains largely confined to rhetoric and called for stricter measures to prevent MPs and MLAs from switching political parties.
“It is not important whether Modi has served longer as Prime Minister than Nehru. What matters is what he has done for the country. Congress workers should take the failures of the Central Government to every household in the coming days,” he said.
Former Minister Vinay Kumar Sorake said that SIR has already been implemented in several states, resulting in lakhs of people allegedly losing their voting rights. He accused the Election Commission of targeting Dalits, tribals, minorities, women, and the poor, thereby attempting to deprive them of their voting rights.
He further alleged that the SIR exercise is a replica of the NRC and CAA. “The Central Government will be directly responsible for the problems arising from this anti-democratic and anti-constitutional exercise. All this is being done as a strategy to win elections. Congress will launch an awareness campaign to protect the voting rights of citizens,” he said.
Udupi District Congress Committee President Ashok Kumar Kodavoor said that, in view of the Special Revision of Electoral Rolls scheduled from June 30 to July 29, the District Congress Committee has planned awareness programmes in every Gram Panchayat across all Assembly constituencies in the district.
He said Congress leaders, BLA-1s, BLA-2s, and party workers are fully prepared and will visit households across Udupi district on June 23 to create awareness about the SIR process. Information will be shared directly with voters, and training is being provided to party workers through BLAs at the booth level.
Kodavoor also stated that district leaders, the ten block presidents of the Udupi District Congress Committee, office-bearers of frontal organizations, and party workers will participate in large numbers in the swearing-in ceremony of newly appointed KPCC President B.K. Hariprasad in Bengaluru on June 21.
Congress Working President Kishan Hegde Kolkebail, along with leaders Uday Shetty Muniyal, Prasad Raj Kanchan, Dinesh Hegde Molahalli, Harish Kini, Raju Poojary, Hariprasad Rai, Jyothi Hebbar, Subodh Rao, Santosh Kulal, Y. Sukumar, Gopinath Bhat, Prashanth Jathanna, Ramesh Kanchan, and Kishore Ermal, among others, were present at the press conference.