Total poll boycott in one Krishnagiri constituency village
The local people have decided to abstain from voting to highlight their demands.
Krishnagiri: For the first time in 68 years, not a single vote was been polled in Ekkalnatham village in the Lok Sabha election on Thursday, since the formation of the Krishnagiri parliamentary constituency in 1951.
“Our villagers have abstained from voting because of road issue,” 55-year- old village headman N. Chinnasamy Naidu told DC.
He added, “the apathy of the officials have forced us to take such a decision because our demand has not been fulfilled for many decades”.
Ekkalnatham, an up-hill village in Veepanahalli assembly segment of Krishnagiri district has a population of 1,500 people and 700 among them are the voters. The local people have decided to abstain from voting to highlight their demands.
The district officials after coming to know of the people’s decision had talks with and the poll boycott was withdrawn by them a few days ago, but the Ekkalnatham villagers have recalled their earlier decision after the election materials reached their village as head-load.
“The villagers during the previous meeting had with them have promised us to take part in the voting process. Now, they have changed their stand against their earlier decision,” district collector, S. Prabhakar told DC.
The Krishnagiri collector Prabhakar added, “our officials had been in talks to convince the villagers with a promise given in writing by us that the road facility will be given to them after the elections are over”.
According to Prabhakar, the district administration, to please the enraged people, had sanctioned Rs. 93 lakh for the road works from the district fund but the villagers could not be talked out of their boycott plan.
Similar was the situation in Kollatti village of Thally assembly segment in Krishnagiri parliamentary constituency. Around 446 voters of this up-hill village had decided not to take part in the voting.
The officials, however, had talks with them and the voting process started with three hours delay at 10 am against the scheduled time of 7 am for start of polling.
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