Election time is also complaints time

Chennai: When the VCK candidate for Villupuram constituency, D Ravikumar, went to the Collectors’ Office to file his nomination papers on Monday, he drove into the premises on a car with a DMK flag flying on the bonnet which was a blatant violation of the Election Commission of India’s instruction on movement of vehicles for nominations, alleged the AIADMK and sought action against the erring officials who did not stop the vehicle outside the periphery of 100 meters earmarked for the purpose.

In a complaint filed with the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), Sathyabrata Sahoo, on Tuesday, AIADMK law advisory committee member R M Babu Murugavel also accused the officials in Villupuram district of showing partiality to the DMK by giving the party permission to hold a meeting on April 5 while rejecting an application by the AIADMK for a street corner meeting on the same day at municipal tidal.

These are just samples of the plethora of complaints landing on the CEO’s table from all political parties on various fronts. On Tuesday, S Suriyamurthy of Avilipatti in Dindigul district wrote to Sahoo urging him to reject all the nominations filed by AIADMK candidates as the Election Commission of India had not yet taken a decision on the ‘Two Leaves’ symbol.

All nominations with A and B forms, for assigning symbols, signed by AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami should not be accepted as he was not recognized as the competent person to signs those forms, Suriyamurthy said in his long letter detailing the history of the rift in the party.

The DMK’s organization secretary R S Bharathi accused the BJP of a corrupt practice under the Section 123 (1A) of the Representation of People’s Act for an advertisement titled ‘BJP –Election Bonus’ in its website offering cash prize of Rs 5000 and more to those who answered objective type questions for a survey.

The complaint said the ‘BJP Election Bonus’ announced in the party’s website amounted to bribery and that the Model Code of Conduct was applicable not just to individual candidates but also to political parties. ‘A national party advertising election bonus is certainly an incitement to the voters, much less direct offering of money t the voters to vote in favour of the Bharatiya Janata Party,’ the complaint by Bharthi said.

He urged the ECI to immediately intervene to ‘uphold the purity of elections’ by taking appropriate action against the BJP and give the party necessary directions to adhere within the framework of law.

Similarly, every party has a complaint against a rival and stacks of them land at the CEOs’ desk, throwing up a challenge to him in sorting them out and taking follow up action.

AIADMK’s Murugavel also raised two other complaints on Tuesday, along with the one objecting to VCK’s Ravikumar arriving at the Collector’s Office to file his nomination accompanied by State Minister for Higher Education K Ponmudi in the car that had the DMK flag.

One was on the fracas that happened at Royapuram where the AIADMK candidate had arrived at the Returning Officer’s Office first and the DMK candidate almost jumped the queue with State Minister P K Sekarbabu barging into the office. Though the AIADMK candidate Royapram Mano was allowed to file the nomination first, on the first come first serve basis, Murugavel saw not only a ‘gross violation of human rights’ in the incident but also a possible threat to his party leaders in the constituency.

Another issue that he raised was on using propaganda vehicles with party flags and stickers. He demanded a circular from the CEO allowing all candidates irrespective of party affiliation to use vehicles with party flags, stickers and also lights fitted to them while canvassing in all the constituencies.