UP: No poll schedue before Jan 3

Amidst all kinds of speculation over poll dates in Uttar Pradesh, Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalswamy made it clear that the election commission was in no position to chalk out an election schedule in view of the prevailing mess in electoral rolls of the state.

Gopalswamy told the press on Thursday evening, "January 3 is the deadline fixed for finalisation of all electoral rolls in the state and unless that is done, we cannot take a decision on the schedule for the elections in UP."

He said, "Only 67 per cent voters of the state have received photo identity cards, while there is an unending list of complaints about fudging in the electoral rolls."

Expressing shock at the state of electoral rolls, he said, "of the 46 lakh (4.6 million) inclusions of new voters in the electoral rolls, as many as 10.61 lakh (1.06 million) objections have been received so far by the election officials."

Though he remained totally evasive on the poll dates, he declared, "Elections will be held positively before May 14, 2007, as the next state assembly has to be necessarily constituted on or before that date, when the existing state assembly completes its full term."

The last state assembly elections were held in February 2002, the formal constitution of the assembly got delayed after the polls threw a hung verdict. Eventually it was constituted on May 14.

Referring to his talk with leaders of other parties, he said, "I have been told that UP education Board has fixed an examination schedule between March and April so it would not be possible to hold the elections during that period either."

He however refused to make any comment on UP Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav's formal request for fixing a poll schedule in February. "We have received a communication from the UP chief minister in this regard and we have also heard representatives of different political parties today", he confirmed.

"However, we will use these as inputs to take a final decision after all the pros and cons have been discussed with my two other commissioner colleagues in the election commission", he pointed out.