'Purging' voter list BJP's old trick to win elections: AAP

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday alleged that the BJP has always been deleting "unfavourable" voters' names from the electoral list in order to win the elections and that they are doing it again with an eye on the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

"To delete those people's names from the electoral list who do not support the BJP is the party's tried and tested strategy. Using this strategy, they have been winning the elections in Gujarat and now, they are doing the same in Delhi," AAP's East Delhi Lok Sabha constituency in-charge Atishi told the media here.

The AAP government has been actively raising this issue ever since they found that about 30 lakh names of voters -- particularly those of Baniya, Muslim and Purvanchali community -- were axed from the electoral list, allegedly on the direction of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP).

She added: "The BJP, which has always been victimising the Muslims, has categorised the Baniyas and Purvanchalis as the second Muslim community in Delhi."

Atishi went on to slam Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his approach towards the voters' deletion matter and said that it is "Modi ji's responsibility to fight for the fundamental right of the 30 lakh voters of Delhi".

"Are Baniyas and Purvanchalis not a part of this country? Do they not deserve their right to vote?" she said.

Giving data on the number of deleted voters from each community, she said that in Jangpura in south Delhi alone names of 27,443 voters have been deleted from the list. "Of this, 5,300 are Baniyas, 4,900 Muslims and 8,500 are Purvanchalis."

In Okhla, she said, 46,700 voters have been removed -- 30,000 Muslims, 11,000 Purvanchalis and 5,700 Baniyas.

The AAP had downloaded the deleted voters' list from the Election Commission's website a few days back, following which they analysed the whole list and found the discrepancy.

--IANS

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