Thaindian News

Kannur (Kerala), Oct 21 (IANS) The voters’ list for Kannur assembly by-poll Nov 7 was published Wednesday with the addition of over 9,000 names since the April-May general elections. While the Congress called the list “fudged”, the ruling Communists refuted charges of irregularities.
“The list that has been finalized has 9,357 new voters and 6,386 names have been deleted,” a state government official said.

Congress-led United Democratic Front Kannur district chief Sunny Joseph said: “From last assembly polls in 2006 to 2009 general elections, the increase in number of voters was merely 350. But from May 2009 till today, the new additions have swelled to 9,357 new votes.

“This itself is enough to prove that this list has been fudged by the CPI-M (Communist Part of India-Marxist) and the majority of the news names are men,” Joseph said.

P. Sasi, the Kannur district CPI-M secretary, said the list has been cleared by the concerned officials and the party accepts it.

“The truth of the issue is that lot of people have been denied their right to exercise their franchise. Let them belong to any party, one’s right to cast their votes should not be denied,” said Sasi.

The Congress has fielded A.P. Abdulla Kutty, who till early this year was a two-time CPI-M Lok Sabha MP, while the Marxist party has fielded a heavy-weight candidate in M.V. Jayarajan, who had won from the nearby Edakadu constituency in 1996 and 2001.

Kutty was booted out of the party ahead of the May general elections for violating party discipline.

“This was expected that there would be so many new votes that the CPI-M would include using their power. But the response that I have been getting is that people have realized what the CPI-M is doing and I would win by a margin of more than 23,000 votes,” said Kutty

The only time the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) has won the Kannur seat was way back in 1977.