NEW DELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party, on Thursday complained to the President, R. Venkataraman, that “gross electoral abuses were witnessed in the Nandyal constituency from where the Prime Minister,

P.V. Narasimha Rao, was elected to the Lok Sabha.

A BJP delegation, led by the party President, Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi and L.K. Advani, leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, met the President and presented him a memorandum. The delegation had a 30minute Jong meeting with Venkatarman,

Advani told the President that the involvement of state governments in subverting the electoral process was a serious matter and complicated the situation, He ex pressed pride that no redpoll had been ordered on the grounds of violence and rigging in the BIP ruled states.

The President was learnt to have advised that all parties should jointly act in this matter.

The memorandum stated “in the history of poll practices, Meham is regarded a notorious name, but we are sorry to state that the happenings in Nandyal out Mehamed even Meham, It accused. The Congress of perpetrating an  electoral fraud and having besmirched the image of Narasimha Rao. It is extremely regrettable that Narasimha Rao has acquiesced in this operation. It stated.

It urged the President to impress upon the government to constitute an all-party committee to suggest comprehensive and radical poll reforms and also to pass three bills on electoral reforms which were already pending before Parliament.

The memorandum accused the Jaw and order machinery of the state of being not just a spectator to the subversion of the rule of Taw” but of actually becoming an instrument of the said subversion, I alleged that organized efforts were made by Congress (1) sup porters to prevent several candidates from filing their nominations. “Candidates were kid napped from the office of the re turning officer, it sad.

After preventing candidates from filing nominations, the state administration and the Congress (D set out to prevent the principal opponent, the BJP, from effectively campaigning. Terror was It loose on BJP activists, election offices were attacked, public meetings were disturbed and vehicles were burnt. All complaints by us fell on deaf ears the memorandum said.

The memorandum said the voters chose to remain indoors on the day of polling.

Article extracted from this publication >> November 29, 1991