Officials said the number of similar EPIC numbers found were miniscule, averaging to around one in four polling stations
New Delhi: The Election Commission of India on Tuesday said that the issue of duplicate EPIC cards was resolved as those who had duplicate card numbers had been issued new numbers and voter cards. Officials said the number of similar EPIC numbers found were miniscule, averaging to around one in four polling stations out of the country's wide network of 10.5 lakh polling stations.
The move came after Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar had in March set a deadline of three months to resolve the issue after receiving complaints from political parties, primarily the Trinamul Congress, alleging duplication in EPIC numbers and voter cards. Flagging the issue the TMC had said that may lead to bogus voting. However, the ECI said it was a legacy issue.
“In its effort to sanitise the electoral rolls and keep them updated, ECI has resolved a nearly 20-year-old legacy issue of similar EPIC numbers which got erroneously issued to genuine electors just because similar series were used by different EROs in such cases since 2005,” sources in ECI said.
They added that in order to resolve this long pending problem, the entire electoral database of over 99-crore electors was searched by Chief Electoral Officers of all the 36 States/Union Territories and Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) of all the 4,123 assembly constituencies across India in all the 10.50 lakh polling stations. On an average there are about 1000 electors per polling station.
Officials said the number of similar EPIC numbers found were miniscule, averaging to around one in four polling stations. “During the field level verification, it was found that holders of such similar EPIC numbers were genuine electors in different assembly constituencies and different polling stations. All such electors have since been issued new EPIC cards with new numbers,” officials said.
