Did you know this Garo village in Assam is not on poll map
GUWAHATI | April 13, 2019:
About 90 km from Guwahati, nestling in the midst of dense forest along the Assam-Meghalaya border, this Garo hamlet is yet to find its place in the country's electoral map.
The 25 families of Longturi Pahar have given up hope of making it to the
electoral rolls in the third phase of polls on April 23. Several visits to the
Kamrup district election office to get themselves enlisted as voters have
borne no fruit.
With neighboring villages buzzing with high decibel campaigns, this
hamlet cuts a sorry figure, as there are no candidates who are visiting that place to seek votes, there are no posters on the walls and no microphones blaring speeches. Neither are there any political discussions about the fate of the state or the country.
But just about 25km from this village, Boko town is witnessing a fierce campaign between BJP and Congress. Nominees and their supporters are sweating it out in the heat wooing the voters.
"Most villagers in Longturi Pahar are original inhabitants, only about five families migrated from insurgency-hit Karbi Anglong. Today, it has about 130 residents who are eligible to vote. We went to the Kamrup district election office twice this year but could not get our problem solved. We will be deprived of our voting rights this year too," said village headman Tharjen R Marak on Friday.
"The campaign trail never reaches us across the dense forests. Poll officials never entered our village so we don't have voter cards," he added.
Apart from power connection, which the villagers got in the last five years, and a muddy road constructed by the villagers themselves, no government scheme has reached them. For drinking water, the families rely on a stream which they have connected to their homes through pipes. Government water supply remains a distant dream.
Another villager, Jipin Sangma, said they settled here almost nine years ago after migrating from Mulajan near Dokmoka in Karbi Anglong in search of land for cultivation. He did not know then that he would land in a village which had no voting rights.
"We paid land revenue at Boko mauzadar's office between 2010 and 2016. We had hoped voting rights would usher in development but nothing happened," Jipin said.
District election officer of Kamrup, Kamal Baishya said that the issue of dual voters may have hampered their entry into electoral rolls.
Source: TOI
